Sunday, March 30, 2008

Fresh Air: Reporter Covering Church Affairs Actually Does Some Homework!

Kudos to Naples News reporter Liam Dillon, who has recently written several articles (here, here, and here) that indicate he actually did some research about the religious topic he was covering.

Pointing this out is no slap at Mr. Dillon, but at his profession, wherein his colleagues across the USA normally cover religion as cliche and simply refuse do the hard work of chewing on foreign concepts and different paradigms, understanding them, and then actually informing their audiences. Maybe it's laziness, maybe it's their own belief that religion is cliche.

But it appears as if Liam Dillon is really interested in getting it right, and in doing the hard work associated with that. Perhaps it is because through his interactions with the people he meets as he covers Ave Maria University and Ave Maria, Florida, he has come to realize that their story and what makes them tick are much more important than a cliche.

While no doubt he will continue to get a few things wrong (almost every article in every newspaper in the country has a few errors), he is to be commended for the effort he is putting into covering Ave Maria. Lets hope that continues.

(Now, if we can only do something about the misleading and/or sensational headlines his editors attach to his work.)