Tuesday’s CBS Evening News provided viewers with a rare look at an issue that’s often been ignored by the media in its coverage of ISIS gaining ground in the Middle East: Christians facing persecution. Fill-in anchor Charlie Rose set the scene by stating the obvious that “Iraq today is a fractured nation” with “[m]uch of the north” now “controlled by ISIS.” Rose then tossed to foreign correspondent Charlie D’Agata to report on “a town where people fear their way of life is disappearing.”
Charlie D'Agata
CBS Spotlights Plight of Iraqi Christians Under Threat from ISIS; ‘Their Way of Life Is Disappearing’
By Curtis Houck | November 4, 2015 | 3:15 AM EST 
By Matthew Balan | September 13, 2013 | 3:44 PM EDT
Friday's CBS This Morning heralded how supposedly, "Pope Francis is already being described as one of the most progressive popes in modern times" after six months as Bishop of Rome. Charlie D'Agata asserted that the pontiff is "the friendly face of the Vatican, the people's pope", and played up how Francis' apparent "spirit of spontaneity, openness, and inclusion has courted controversy...It includes extending an olive branch to the gay community." [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump]
On Wednesday, NBC Nightly News also underlined how Pope Francis seemingly "has changed the tone in a church plagued by the sex abuse scandal, emphasizing Church teaching on helping the poor and social justice....it's not just what the new pope says that's a sign of a changing church – it's what he does – getting close to people...enjoying the crowds that flock to him."