{December 23rd, 2004}
What was the Gazette thinking??
My Sunday paper is always crammed full of stuff I don’t want: A tube of toothpaste, a mouthwash sample, dishwasher detergent. But a New Testament? I’m speechless. Speechless and appalled.
Yes, the Gazette is a for-profit company. Yes, they have the right to sell distribution rights to willing buyers. Yes, it’s a free country, I don’t have to subscribe to the paper, I don’t have to read the book, yadda yadda yadda. I understand all that. I even believe it.
But there’s so much more going on here. For one, the national media are having a field day. Whatever else happens in this town, we’ll be known forever as the place where you get a free Bible with your Sunday paper. Whether you want it or not.
Doesn’t the Gazette know how many people want to paint it as a culturally conservative, right-wing rag in the pocket of the Religious Right? I know that’s not true, and I tell that to anyone who’ll listen. But slipping a New Testament in my Sunday funnies doesn’t help my case.
What were evangelicals thinking?
By now, their copy of “God’s Word” has been backed over by Humvees, drooled on by Fido, and dumped in the trash. I presume they’re OK with this. Perhaps if it brings one soul to Jesus, they think it’s worth it.
By contrast, my faith insists on a strict separation between the sacred and the ordinary. In fact, one of our most beautiful rituals ends with a blessing of gratitude for that very separation. We don’t put our scriptures on the floor of our Temple. How could we risk putting them on the floor of your car?
It turns my stomach to see that distinction blurred. Then again, I live in a town where people put religious symbols next to their tailpipes. It’s a wonder my guts aren’t completely inside out by now.
Some of you may remember my column on ground rules for religious discussion. I was delighted to hear from a pastor who agreed completely. So why is his church a sponsor?
What is that pastor thinking?
Stuffing unsolicited religious works into someone else’s paper breaks every one of the rules I thought reasonable people could agree on. It’s insulting to nonevangelicals, and it confuses passion with evidence. Worst of all, it doesn’t distinguish between statements of fact and statements of faith.
Just look at the cover: “Colorado Springs: Our City” “The New Testament, God’s Word”. A statement of fact, followed by a statement of faith. One with which I take issue.
And it only gets worse. Looking inside, we find handy facts about Coloradoes Springs. Then we learn the death and resurrection of Jesus are also “facts”. What’s the connection? Is listing facts about Colorado Springs supposed to establish credibility? I might expect that on the Home Shopping Channel. But from a religious group that claims the moral high ground? I’m unimpressed.
What am I thinking?
I’m thinking: Please don’t cancel your subscription. That’s like not voting on Election Day. That’s like walking off the field when the ref makes a bad call. You make a point, but you’re out of the game. And you don’t really want to be out of the game. That’s where the action is. Besides, I’d hate to lose readers.
I’m thinking that if you’ve still got “Our City” but you don’t know what to do with it, you can at least keep it out of Our Landfill. Return it to one of the sponsors. Better still, give it to a homeless shelter or an evangelical friend.
More than anything else, though, I’m thinking about the betrayal of principles for cash. I know times are hard for newspapers, but was this absolutely necessary? Newspapers should be beacons of factual information and builders of community. How much does it cost to set those principles aside?
Thirty thousand dollars. According to the Colorado Springs Independent, that’s about how much the International Bible Society paid to distribute their book. Which is interesting, because if you open it and turn to page 22, you can read a heartrending story about the betrayal of ideals for money.
Something about thirty pieces of silver.
Here’s a reply the Gazette gave to this article:
SEAN PAIGE Editorial page editor
We on the editorial page appreciate Barry Fagin’s take on the issues. That’s why we give him space here every other week. His liberty-loving ideals generally fit in well with our own editorial philosophy. His arguments are usually well-reasoned and substantive.
Unfortunately, although he’s entitled to his opinion, the adjacent column isn’t a shining example of these attributes.
The “Freedom philosophy” reflected daily on these pages holds as its ideal the robust and unfettered exchange of ideas, from left to right, religious to secular, serious to silly. Freedom Communications, our parent company, and The Gazette also are private, for-profit businesses that sustain themselves and thousands of company associates with advertising revenues.
As such, allowing an advertiser to include copies of the New Testament in Sunday’s newspaper was consistent with both our mission and our values, and is in no way the sellout Fagin suggests. If anyone has compromised high ideals in this debate, it’s Fagin.
He acknowledges, but then promptly dismisses, the most salient points in his column. Fagin understands that we are a private, forprofit company. He concedes our right to sell space to willing advertisers. He notes that our subscribers have the opportunity to read or not read those advertisements, as they see fit. Then he dismisses all this as “yadda, yadda, yadda.”
As believers in a free press and free expression; as merchants in the marketplace of ideas; as opponents of discrimination in all its forms; and as a profit-driven company —what else could we do but accept this promotion? The real betrayal of principles, the real hypocrisy, the real demonstration of bias would have been for The Gazette to have shunned this particular advertiser simply because it was promoting religious ideas or because the product might be thought controversial by some.
The Gazette has the discretion to reject advertisements that don’t conform with common standards of decency. But that would have been a hard argument to make in this case.
Admittedly, this is a relatively new way for the International Bible Society to get its word out. But it’s not unprecedented. Newspapers already have done it in Houston and Chattanooga, Tenn., and papers in other cities will probably follow suit, if they aren’t intimidated by the controversy.
Today we see the proliferation of religiously themed television and radio broadcasts, print publications, Web sites, movies and popular music. Is a newspaper insert any more objectionable than any of these? We don’t think so.
Thankfully, Americans enjoy the freedom to change the channel, turn the page, read or not to read. And no one who received a New Testament on Sunday was compelled to read it — any more than The Gazette can command readers to purchase or patronize whatever else is mentioned or advertised in our pages.
Newspapers trade in ideas and messages. Religious ideas are among the most important there are. It’s up to readers — not us — to decide what messages they embrace or shun. And the vast majority of readers have no problem telling the difference between our editorials, news stories and print ads.
As a college professor, Fagin surely understands that a paid advertisement in no way constitutes an endorsement, and that the news side of the paper functions separately from the business side (as this editorial page does from the news side). The professional journalists who work at The Gazette aren’t about to allow business decisions to cloud their judgment or color their reporting. It’s an insult for Fagin to suggest as much.
The Gazette’s participation in this promotion is no more an endorsement of Christianity than an advertisement for a synagogue is an endorsement of Judaism, an advertisement for a mosque is an endorsement of Islam . . . or a Barry Fagin column is an endorsement of his views.
A truly free press aims not at excluding, but at including as many views as possible, whether published free of charge in our opinion pages or appearing as paid advertisements. The Gazette would be no more inclined to silence someone advertising religion than it would be to silence Fagin.
Write to Paige c/o The Gazette, P.O. Box 1779, Colorado Springs, 80901