Is Roger Ailes engaging in evangelizing on his "news" network? While reality based networks are having discussions on American gun violence and the ready availablity of high powered weaponry, Fox News is turning to God by preaching the necessity of faith in times of crisis. And while 70% of Newtown's population is Catholic there are other groups - 6%, Jewish and 10% of the 24% of "other" groups are liberal mainline Protestants as well as 2% Muslims. But on Fox, the religious perspective, so far, has been from the Catholic Fr. Jonathan Morris and the evangelical Mike Huckabee. And in further promoting Fox preferred Christianity, fundamentalist Christian Shannon Bream interviewed the head of a group of Billy Graham's crisis counselors who have swept into Newtown to comfort the afflicted by giving them hope in the lord.
Bream, a graduate of Liberty University and another Fox News former beauty queen (In 1991 she was Miss Virginia and in the top ten of the Miss America contest) reported that the Billy Graham chaplains were in Newtown CT. She asked Jack Munday, of the Billy Graham Evanglistic Association and Graham's "Rapid Response Team," about his mission. He said that "We recognize that the only real hope that people can have is through the lord and much of what we're hearing on TV centers around faith and we recognize that this is a critical time for everybody to tap in to what God's comfort and hope is all about."
Bream asked "why do you think in times of crisis we're so quick to turn to that place." Munday said that "a relationship experiencing god's comfort and his hope is what people seek" and that even if a person hasn't attended church, "they realize there's a hole there and turn to God." He added that "They ask us a lot of God questions but we don't pretend to have all the answers but we do know that there is a God who loves and cares for them and decides to come along side in times that could be the darkest hour of their life.
Bream thanked him and his team for "listening" and "being a presence for those in need. She then gave the audience Billy Graham's website address.
Right, Graham's team has no religious agenda because it's just about helping folks. Yet, according to one of the team leaders, "We are seeing where they are in their struggles, we are letting them know that we care about them, and that Jesus loves them. We want to help them get through the struggle..."
As the SNL "Church Lady" would say, "Isn't that special."
