New York Yankees

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Plug-In: From Loretta Lynn to Aaron Judge, the week's top nine religion newsmakers

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Plug-In: From Loretta Lynn to Aaron Judge, the week's top nine religion newsmakers

A country music queen. A home run king.

A former White House press secretary. A current U.S. Supreme Court plaintiff.

They are among nine key religion newsmakers who made headlines this past week (in alphabetical order):

• Bart Barber: I’m showing a little bias here because I wrote this week’s Associated Press profile of Barber, a small-town Texas pastor and rancher elected to lead the 13.7 million-member Southern Baptist Convention at a time of major crisis. Barber will be featured Sunday night in a “60 Minutes” interview with Anderson Cooper.

• Chris Jones and Sarah Huckabee Sanders: Jones is the Democrat and Sanders the Republican in Arkansas’ gubernatorial race. “With two preachers’ kids and a pastor in the race, Arkansans are poised to elect a governor who can sing hymns by heart and quote Scripture from memory,” the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s Frank Lockwood writes as he delves into faith and politics. (Sanders served as former President Donald Trump’s White House press secretary from 2017 to 2019.)

• Aaron Judge: The New York Yankees star made history when he hit his 62nd home run of the season Tuesday night. Prayer and faith played a key role during Judge’s chase, reports the Deseret News’ Ryan McDonald.

• Loretta Lynn: The country music superstar and Kentucky coal miner’s daughter died Tuesday at age 90. “She really was serious about her faith and a devout member of the church,” retired minister Terry Rush, who maintained a close friendship with Lynn, told me.

• John Henry Ramirez: The Texas killer fought all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to have his pastor lay hands on him and pray during his execution. “Just know that I fought a good fight, and I am ready to go,” Ramirez said before his death by lethal injection Wednesday, as noted by The Associated Press’ Juan A. Lozano and Michael Graczyk.

• Lorie Smith and Jack Phillips: The two claim in an opinion piece for USA Today that Colorado is trampling on their First Amendment rights as Christian artists, and they’re fighting back. Website designer Smith’s case is headed to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Deseret News’ Kelsey Dallas reports.


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Friday Five: Dodger blues, religious freedom threat, Bathsheba raped?, judge's faith, Chick-fil-A hero

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This week in news from the baseball gods: They sure don’t seem to like the Los Angeles Dodgers (or the Atlanta Braves).

In the National League Championship Series, I’ll be rooting for the Washington Nationals to defeat the St. Louis Cardinals (I’m a Texas Rangers fan, after all, still dealing with whiplash from what the Cardinals did in the 2011 World Series).

On the American League side, I must decide whether to support the Houston Astros (the Rangers’ division rival) or the New York Yankees (the Evil Empire). Hey, is it possible to root against both?

Meanwhile, let’s dive into the Friday Five:

1. Religion story of the week: Did you catch that headline, via the Deseret News’ Kelsey Dallas? “During LGBTQ rights town hall, top Democrats call for limits on religious freedom.”

It’s a must read.

Already, this story — including Beto O’Rourke pledging to strip the tax-exempt status from churches that refuse to change their doctrines to accept same-sex marriage — is causing an uproar in conservative media. And it’s drawn attention elsewhere in the mainstream press, too.


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'Born-again' baseball star's arrest on child sexual assault charge raises a journalistic question

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"This is truly, truly an awful story to report,” tweeted a Dallas Morning News sportswriter involved in the coverage of a child sexual abuse charge against former baseball star John Wetteland.

Actually, it’s beyond awful.

It’s sickening, especially for a diehard Texas Rangers fan like myself who remembers cheering for Wetteland and appreciating his focus on his Christian faith.

According to the Dallas newspaper, the former closer is accused of sexually abusing a young child:

Wetteland, 52, is accused of continuous sexual abuse of a child under the age of 14, according to Denton County jail records. The Trophy Club resident posted $25,000 bond and was released from custody the same day as his arrest.

He had forced a young relative to perform a sex act on him, according to the arrest warrant affidavit, beginning in 2004 when the child was just four years old.

The abuse occurred at Wetteland's home in Bartonville, the affidavit stated. It happened twice more over a two-year period, the victim said.

And sadly, there is a strong and absolutely relevant religion angle as Wetteland — who was the 1996 World Series MVP while pitching for the New York Yankees — is well-known for touting his Christian beliefs.

“Wetteland Is Just a Closer Who Walks With the Lord,” declared a 1995 New York Times sports column.

That column opened this way:

John Wetteland is drinking coffee from a large mug with the words "Jesus Lives" emblazoned across it in big, black letters. He grins and nods when someone comments on the mug. His Bible is resting on a shelf in his locker and he has a personal computer at his disposal so he can retrieve morning devotionals from an on-line program and pray before the Yankees begin another day of baseball.

"I honestly try and walk with Jesus Christ every day," he said, describing his most important relationship, more important than his relationship with his wife.

Obviously, the facts of the criminal case are the most important element of the news reports on Wetteland’s arrest.


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Grab a tissue before reading this: A young Astros fan got a home run ball, and this is why it's so special

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I love baseball, even though my beloved Texas Rangers didn't make the playoffs this season.

As a Texas fan, I'm finding it especially difficult to root for either team in the American League Championship Series. That best-of-seven series, tied 2-2 heading into today's Game 5, pits the Evil Empire (the New York Yankees) vs. the Rangers' in-state rival (the Houston Astros). I don't suppose there's any way that both teams could lose, is there?

But seriously, folks ...

My friend David, a minister in Houston, alerted me to a tear-jerking feature story about a young Astros fan who ended up with a home run ball. This story almost makes me want to root for Houston. Almost.

The piece ran at the top of the Houston Chronicle's front page today. And yes, there's a religion angle. More on that in a moment.

"I don't know if you saw this, but it brought me to tears in public when I read it," David said. "Great writing."

Although I subscribe to the Chronicle, I hadn't read it yet today, so I appreciated my friend calling my attention to this story.

The lede:

When Amanda Riley arrived at Minute Maid Park for Game 1 of the Astros-Yankees American League Championship Series, she couldn't contain her tears.
"We walk in, and all I'm seeing are families and dads holding their sons up," Riley said. "The whole time all I could think about was that we're there as a family, too, but we're missing one."
Four weeks earlier, 15-year-old Cade Riley — Amanda and Mike Riley's oldest son — died in an all-terrain vehicle accident on a trail near the family's home in Liberty Hill.
Since then, Amanda, Mike and their son Carson had trouble finding the motivation to leave the house as a family.
Mike knew it was time, and he made a decision that put his family directly in the path of a crucial Carlos Correa home run and made their youngest son the center of media attention and the object of Astros players' affection. 

Keep reading, and the Chronicle offers relevant details on how the family ended up at two ALCS games in Houston last week — and on the providential circumstances that seemed to surround their time at Minute Maid Park. No, the newspaper never uses the phrase "providential circumstances," but the family's quotes make no doubt that they see them as such.


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Zen Pastor Mariano Rivera and his vague, comforting karma

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Lat’s state the obvious: It’s getting harder and harder for news consumers to figure out when they are reading straight news coverage and when they are reading columns, editorials and analysis pieces.


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