In spite of the deaths of their comrades, two working-slug journalists put their grief on hold to spend the night doing the unappreciated jobs they do for a living. Josh McKerrow, left, a staff photographer, and Pat Furgurson, a staff reporter, worked Thursday on the next day’s newspaper from a pickup truck in a mall parking garage in Annapolis. (New York Times photo by Nate Pence)
I left the journalism profession in the year 2000 because I was called to serve God and the church in ordained ministry.
But my first calling in life, at age 16 or so, was to journalism. I even worked my way through the first two years of seminary at SMU working full-time as an associate editor for The United Methodist Reporter.
Nobody loves reporters and editors except other reporters and editors, people like myself who were called into a profession in which you won’t ever win any popularity contest–not if you do your job with honesty and integrity.
Even though I left journalism a long time ago, I’ll always miss the camaraderie unique to the news profession.
I’ll always stand in solidarity with journalists around the world who slug away every day seeking the truth in the face of enormous resistance from people who want very much to keep people in the dark and can’t stand the light that journalists are trying to shine on them.
Journalists are definitely not perfect people and sometimes they blow it. In fact, resisters work hard sometimes to make sure they blow it so they can bash them. It’s a hard, tricky profession where a lot of people are out to get you.
Yet contrary to what some shamelessly corrupt, lying American leaders want you to believe–and you may believe it yourself–they (we journalists!) are not “enemies of the people.”
Gosh, you’d be surprised to know how many of them love the God and feel like they are doing God’s work in speaking truth to power.
See the profiles of the dead journalists here and pray for their families if you will because Journalist’s Lives Matter just like yours.
Jitterbugging for Jesus 
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