In conclusion, let me once again stress that the goal is to promote accurate and in-depth news coverage of a subject that is crucial to American life and has been proven to be important to mainstream readers. The way to improve religion coverage is by doing the same things you do to improve work on any other beat. The roots of the religion-coverage dilemma run deep into the news process. I believe there are four major biases that affect coverage of religion news. You cannot print a story if you have little space in which to print it, time to write it, or the money to hire a professional to do so.
Many editors insist resources are too thin to support religion coverage.
But anyone who understands newsrooms knows budgets are windows into the priorities of those who manage them. Budgets help shape news. You cannot write a story if you do not know that it exists. Journalists work hard to become trained political, arts or sports reporters. But editors do not consider it a high priority to hire professional religion writers.