Neutrality and equal treatment are ideas most people fight for in government and political arenas. They're not quite so willing to advocate these principles when it comes to religion. UNC religion professors do not include mainline Protestantism among their scholarly interests and with rare exceptions they don't follow these unfolding dramas. On these more newsy stories, I do better talking to activist ministers and lay people, denominational spokespersons and, from time to time, scholars at other institutions. That's as it should be.
Scholars can provide the big picture.
They can temper my zeal for trendy stories by showing me historical cycles. They can introduce thoughtful questions that only a trained scholar might ask. My role is to translate their insights into language newspaper readers can understand-and to report the news for myself. I first encountered journalists while I taught at the University of Miami in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Because I was the only specialist in U.S. religion within several hundred miles, local print and television media called on me regularly to pontificate about national stories like the fall of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker.