Who Says Faith Isn't A Story?

Glen Burnie Writer Works To Explain Believers, Journalists To Each Other

"He has plenty of indispensability left in him," the Time writer says.

And Mattingly sees more to be done.

Take that huge, growing Pentecostalist movement in and around New York, largely uncovered in the media, that reflects how immigrants continue to change America. Or that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, sees himself as the "Twelfth Imam" - a fact that has apocalyptic implications, given that nation's pursuit of the bomb. Or last week's closing of Catholic High in Towson? "How come The Sun didn't get into the demographics of that parish?" he asks.

Meanwhile, U2 is coming through Washington this summer, and Mattingly hopes to persuade Bono, with whom he's still in occasional contact, to sit down and speak about faith with journalism students.

He turns to his computer, clicking on an article about Sunni Islam, a topic he says the media still hasn't gotten right, even after covering a war it could have helped explain.

"And people say the religion beat is boring?" he says, shaking his head. "Dude, on what planet?"