Religion in the Media

During the past two decades, the media’s interest in, and presentation of, the sacred has been expressed in many forms. News coverage of perceived “Satanic” cult activities, coverage of specific religious based military conflicts, the occasional Christian faith based prime time television series and their opposite number, the occult based show.

In the 1980’s and the early 1990’s news media helped to fuel the belief in Satanic Ritual Abuse (SRA) by presenting faulty evidence and misrepresenting underground or “occult” based faith groups. For more than a decade, TV personalities such as Geraldo Rivera had many Americans convinced that upwards of 50,000 children a year where being ritually murdered by a highly organized network of satanic cults.

This belief was also perpetuated in part by radical gropes such as Heavens Gate, whose members committed suicide in the belief that their soles would be taken to heaven by aliens. The governments mishandling of, and the media’s misrepresentation of, the Branch Davidians in Waco Texas also helped foster mistrust and fear of “radical” fringe groups and their followers.

It took almost 15 years before the mainstream media admitted that SRA, as well as other “occult” related crimes, where largely the product of faulty interrogation techniques used on children, the exaggerated stories of teens who dabbled in “occult” religions, and the misrepresentation of the media itself.

More recently, aspects of the sacred have been represented in the news media largely in the form of coverage of religious conflicts. These include the ongoing conflict in Israel, the recent American lead war in Iraq, and the centuries old conflicts in the Balkan region of Europe.

Unfortunately for the public, these conflicts are also misrepresented by the media. It is virtual anathema to mention the fact that these conflicts are religious in nature.

For example, much attention was paid to the mass murder of ethnic Albanians in the Balkan conflict. The media has called the results of this type of conflict “ethnic cleansing”, but for the most part neglect to articulate that these conflicts are spurred on by religious, not ethnic, differences.

On the other hand, television shows such as Touched by an Angel and Highway to Heaven, attempted to spread a Christian message of peace and good will. Prime time television shows such as these tried to foster an atmosphere of peace and goodwill. But the way in which this message was broadcast (just be nice and everybody will get along) was idealistic at best and in truth more foolhardy than realistic.

In contrast to these Christian faith based shows, television shows devoted to the occult, such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Charmed, or the classic soap opera Dark Shadows often tried to spread the same message. However, because of the occult nature of these shows, positive messages where often ignored. The shows themselves have been criticized and boycotted for not being Christian enough or for promoting the occult.

Aside from the various television and news media, the Sacred has an enormous representation in popular printed fiction. Popular books ranging from the Armageddon based series Left Behind to the often banned and persecuted Harry Potter series are, in their own way, helping to spread the message of peace and good will.