The remarkable documentary "God in America," which aired last week on PBS, deserves praise for the beautiful way it captures America's dramatic story of faith and conscience. It's a richly produced piece of filmmaking worthy of discussion and viewing.
But the station erred in its decision to essentially exclude the story of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in its diverse history of religion in the United States. Mormons are only mentioned twice in the documentary in a way that comprises less than a sentence of this six-hour production.
The station, however, did air a full documentary on Mormonism a few years ago. Now, I am not saying there was some deliberate bias against the LDS here because producers also excluded many stories of other minority religious faiths. There was no mention of Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of the Christian Science movement; or William Miller, whose millennial predictions led to the rise of the Adventist movement; or Charles Taze Russell and the Jehovah's Witnesses.
But the exclusion of these minority faiths was a significant omission nonetheless. As those who study media bias often suggest, exclusion can be a way of delegitimizing minorities. The documentary became a story of mainstream, traditional "God in America" not the story of those minority religions, and it was the less for it.
I have found that journalists over the years delegitimize my Mormon faith by neglecting its essences, even though they do it without malice. Take the Book of Mormon for example. In my research on Mormons and the media, I have read scores, if not hundreds, of stories about Mormonism that do mention the Book of Mormon when not to long ago that wasn't the case.
But journalists rarely talk about what the Book of Mormon actually teaches.I have read several stories that talk about the gold plates Joseph Smith said he found in a hill, but I find few, if any, journalists who talk of the Book of Mormon as Mormons do through the lens of Moroni's promise of praying about the Book of Mormon would reveal its truth. This simple verse is central to what Mormonism is and how we present ourselves to world. By largely ignoring this central principle, journalists, therefore, suggest that they don't take the Church's central claims seriously.
For what it is worth, I have seen no mentions of Alma or Helaman or Mosiah in any journalistic accounts. In missing these details, the profound impact of the Book of Mormon in the lives of Latter-day Saints is lost, and a complete picture of who Mormons are somehow goes missing. "God in America" is worth watching, but I would have liked to hear more about the place that Mormonism and other Christian religious minorities occupy in American religious life.
Indeed, a clear point of "God in America" is that America's journey to religious diversity has come with tentative steps amid persecution, banishment and imprisonment. Excluding the stories of minority religions weakened the point. It is in out-of-the-mainstream faiths like Mormonism that some the greatest challenges to religious diversity developed and sometimes continue to develop in America.
"God in America" powerfully includes the story of Anne Hutchinson, the religious visionary banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1637 for her preaching. During a trial, she argued that her preaching was a matter of conscience. Gov. John Winthrop responded, "Your conscience you must keep, or it must be kept for you." "God in America" showed America has rejected the thinking of John Winthrop, allowing a place for people like Hutchinson and a place for Mormons. The Mormon story of loyalty to religious principles and of the successful quest for religious liberty amid persecution shows this powerfully as well. In my opinion, the documentary would have been a stronger had it included the Mormon story.