Culture/Society

Brian Williams and Chris Matthews couldn't resist the opportunity to harp on the lack of married and women priests in the Catholic Church, as MSNBC provided live coverage of Pope Francis's open-air Mass in Philadelphia on Sunday. Williams pointed out that one of the archbishops at the Mass is "from a family, [but] he cannot go home to one. He cannot have one, and be...of service to the Catholic…

Hours after 2016 Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina sparred with NBC’s Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd over the Planned Parenthood videos, Sunday’s NBC Nightly News similarly went to bat for the abortion provider against Fiorina as White House correspondent Kristen Welker scolded Fiorina for promoting videos with “doctored and unrelated footage.”

MSNBC's Chris Matthews revealed his loathing for a part of his Catholic upbringing on Wednesday's Hardball, and ended up mangling the theology behind a beautiful and ancient Church ritual for new mothers. Matthews turned to Catholic dissident Sister Simone Campbell for her take on Pope Francis's visit. Sister Campbell touted her liberal "Nuns on the Bus" campaign as a supposed way to "take the…

Variations on the term “Bush Derangement Syndrome” are common on both the right and the left (a Google search for “Clinton Derangement Syndrome” yielded roughly 180,000 results). Therefore, it wasn’t surprising to see Indiana University law prof Steve Sanders modify Charles Krauthammer’s famous coinage in order to trash religious conservatives. “The Christian right is deep in the grip of gay…

Liberal Esquire political columnist Charles Pierce, formerly with the Boston Globe, joined MSNBC’s All In on Thursday during live coverage of Pope Francis’s visit to New York City and used the occasion of the Pope’s speech hours earlier before Congress to lash out at Ted Cruz and conservatives for not endorsing climate change or other liberal social issues as does the Pontiff. 

During a live NBC special report minutes after Pope Francis concluded his address to Congress on Thursday, Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd hailed the speech and hoped it would prevent a possible government shutdown over defunding Planned Parenthood: “I can’t help – and I apologize for bringing in crass politics into this, but we are six days from the government possibly shutting down and I…

The media have a knack of turning giving liberal activists a platform when it covers the Catholic Church. The latest example is CNN's Chris Cuomo turning to Episcopalian bishop/LGBT activist Gene Robinson moments after Pope Francis spoke at the White House on Wednesday. Cuomo noted that Robinson was part of "a number of people that were seen as controversial" among the invited guests at the…

Yes, the head of the Catholic Church is popular. And it’s because of that, that the liberal media smear his image to their own advantage. The networks herald the “popular pope” where they agree with him, and censor him where they don’t (abortion, marriage). Media outlets from the Washington Post to MSNBC pit him against conservatives to create the illusion that he is one with them: a liberal. A…

Thomas Roberts set aside four full segments on his MSNBC Live program on Monday and Tuesday to a panel of six Catholics who dissent from the Church's teachings on sexuality and abortion. Roberts hyped his guests as "Catholics like me who have been deeply wounded in life by the Church." He noted how a divorced woman stayed with the Church and asked, "Do you feel as if you're almost on a cyclical…

Anderson Cooper gave liberal author Reza Aslan a platform to bash Republicans on the Monday edition of his CNN program. Aslan asserted that Dr. Ben Carson's "I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation" remark is just the latest example that "xenophobia [and] anti-Muslim bashing...[is] how you get votes." He also stated that "the only thing I'm surprised about is that the..…

Hannibal’s gone, but there’s still plenty of horrifying content on television. Cox hinted in a Monday column that some of it’s on C-SPAN, courtesy of congressional Republicans. Regarding a possible government shutdown over funding for Planned Parenthood, Cox asserted, “Forget shrinking government to the size it can be drowned in a bathtub, the politicians clamoring for another shutdown want…

Being an anchor on the Cable News Network has sent Anderson Cooper into many unusual situations -- including conflicts in Somalia, Bosnia and Rwanda -- but none of those experiences could have prepared him for what happened during a concert by popular singer Madonna Louise Ciccone in Brooklyn on Saturday night during her “Rebel Heart Tour.” While singing a vulgarity-laced tune called “…

CNN's Alisyn Camerota badgered and lectured Armstrong Williams, Ben Carson's business manager, on Monday's New Day over the Republican presidential candidate's Sunday statement that he "would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation." Camerota quoted Article VI of the U.S. Constitution regarding religious tests for public office, and contended that "Dr. Carson's belief system…

Sunday's New York Times story by Joseph Goldstein appearing on Page A1 above the fold in Monday's print edition contains absolutely appalling news. Goldstein's report — originally headlined and appearing in print as "U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies' Abuse of Boys", and currently carried online as "U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Sexual Abuse of Boys by Afghan Allies" — asserts that "…