First in a two-part series
At the end of 2023, CBC Radio will discontinue its long-running program. tapestry After host Mary Hynes announced her retirement. This weekly radio show focused on spirituality and religion and was one of her last remaining religious programs in Canada in English-language secular media.
“Whenever a host leaves, we have the opportunity to review our programming schedule and consider how best to provide a variety of content to Canadians. At the same time, we consider other programming offers and, of course, financial considerations. ,” said Alison Brodl, Senior Director. said a CBC News audio and podcasting representative. Anglican Journal.
“We intend to continue this type of programming both on CBC Radio 1 and with our podcasting content,” she added, adding, “Connecting with people about spirituality in life is a mission of existing programs such as It is part of the.” Sunday Magazine. Hines did not respond to requests for an interview.
The end of the tapestry It came amid a long decline in religious journalism. Journalists who have reported on faith and spirituality spoke. Anglican Journal Over the past few decades, religious coverage by secular media has declined. They say this trend parallels the decline in the importance of religion for Canadians and changes in the media itself. But they also see reason for hope in a resurgence of secular religious journalism driven by new reporting models and the continued importance of spirituality to Canadians.
John Longhurst, faith reporter winnipeg free pressis, to his knowledge, the only journalist left in Canadian English-language secular media focused on religion. Longhurst works as a freelance contractor. He says the paper treats him like any other reporter, but he is not a staff member and receives no salary or benefits. Instead, he finances his work through online crowdfunding and donations from faith groups.
“the current, free press is the only one [secular] Newspapers that devote all their resources to reporting [religion] “In a deliberate way,” he says. winnipeg free presshe points out, is in a somewhat unique position as one of the last remaining independent daily newspapers in the country.
Changes in the media environment
In 1998, Longhurst organized Canada’s first national conference on faith and media, which he says took place in a very different media environment. “We had religious journalists from all over the country…it was recognized as an important part of almost every major media outlet that would report in their community,” he says.
Longhurst doesn’t believe the decline in coverage is due to deliberate anti-religious sentiment. “I think most people think it’s irrelevant,” he says. Statistics Canada’s 2021 Census shows more than one-third of Canadians report no religious affiliation, more than double the proportion from 20 years ago.
Longhurst also points to a long-term trend of media shrinkage and cuts. “When things started to get tough financially, the first thing the media cut out was what I call the ‘soft’ beat…religion is considered soft and not important enough to hold on to. It was one of the beats.
Joyce Smith, an associate professor at Toronto Metropolitan University’s (TMU) School of Journalism, points out a similar trend. Mr. Smith, who was raised as a Roman Catholic but is now a nondenominational Christian, previously worked in a church. toronto star and gloves and mail.
She recalls urging editors to cover more issues of faith. A common reaction was that hiring a religion reporter meant firing someone in sports or business.
“It was funny to me that they thought it was outrageous,” Smith says. “Unfortunately, we are reaching a situation where there is no one to lay off to make room for religious professionals.”
Decline of church pages
Longhurst and Smith note the disappearance of the “church page,” which was once a mainstay of secular Canadian newspapers. Paid for by advertisements from local churches, the page also featured columns and sermons by local clergy.
“Those sections and pages started disappearing relatively recently,” Smith said.
Changes in religion reporting reflect larger structural changes in Canadian society and the backgrounds of journalists, she added. Churches are often part of governing structures, and many journalists come from Christian traditions. Smith said there is still coverage of Christianity, but it is now more critical and tends to cover the role of the church in boarding schools and sexual abuse by clergy.
“These are really important stories and we need to cover them,” Smith said. But she says covering only religion in cases of conflict is comparable to a business section covering only failed businesses.
Faith still pervades the news
Despite the decline of organized religion, spirituality remains important to many people in Canada.
In 2019, according to Statistics Canada, 68 per cent of the population reported having a religious affiliation, and 54 per cent said religious or spiritual beliefs were important to their way of life. 37% said they participated in a solo religious or spiritual activity at least once a month, and 23% said they participated in a group religious activity at least once a month in the past year.
Meanwhile, Longhurst says “religion-related issues are creeping back onto the government’s agenda”, including medical assistance in dying, abortion rights and parental rights in education.
Religion is also featured in local news. Longhurst recalled writing about a group in Winnipeg collecting food and distributing it to food banks. More than 50 percent of the food banks they supplied were found in churches and places of worship. “You can’t talk about hunger and poverty in almost any region without considering the church’s response,” he says.
At TMU, Smith teaches a course called “Religious Reporting.” Each week, she asks her students to focus on how religion shows up in other areas, such as sports or business.
“It’s very hard to find a newspaper that doesn’t have religion in it, even if it’s a non-religious newspaper,” Smith said.
Alternative model
Many journalists who want to report on faith are turning to other models, such as Longhurst’s self-funding as a faith reporter. He raises his $20,000 to his $25,000 each year through crowdfunding and from readers and faith groups.
Many religious organizations that fund their own media face the same downsizing and budget challenges as secular media, Smith said. Canada’s growing diversity is also recognized among younger journalists, which could have an impact on religion reporting. Smith remembers researching applications to journalism graduate schools after 9/11. He said: “We had people writing to us saying, ‘I’m a Muslim and I really want to help improve coverage of my community.'”
“We are slowly but surely becoming more diverse in our newsrooms,” she added. “With that comes a need for a little more diversity and understanding of religious traditions and worldviews, and that can only be a good thing.
