BYU’s Wheatley Institute: Why Sheri Dew Is Helping the Media Tell Better Stories About Faith

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By Kaitlyn Bancroft, Church News

When Sheri Dew’s mother died during the summer of 2020, the police force in her small Kansas hometown insisted on escorting the hearse to the cemetery.

On the way there, Sister Dew looked out her window and saw a woman who had pulled over and was standing with her head bowed as the procession passed. The gesture moved Sister Dew to tears.

“I have no idea who she was. ... I don’t know anything about her,” said the executive vice president of Deseret Management Corporation and former member of the Relief Society general presidency.

“But in that little moment, I saw profound reverence and respect demonstrated by this unknown woman.”

That image — a stranger on the side of the road, paying homage to another stranger — has remained “emblazoned” in Sister Dew’s mind and heart for two reasons, she said. One is that it was simply a tender moment on a difficult day. But the other is because of how that woman refuted media stereotypes about people of faith.

“How often ... when you go and sample any kind of media, do you see that kind of a depiction of that kind of person?” Sister Dew asked, adding, “I’ll bet you there are way more of that [kind of] woman in this country than we think. But that’s probably not ... [how] we always see them represented [in the media].”

Sister Dew explored interactions between religion and the media on Wednesday, April 1, during a Brigham Young University Wheatley Institute forum titled “The Intersection of Faith, Media and Wellness.”

It’s a topic that Sister Dew thinks about often, given her professional role. Owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Deseret Management Corporation encompasses Deseret News, Deseret Magazine, Church News, KSL-TV and KSL NewsRadio stations and other media outlets.

It also operates the Radiant Foundation, a nonprofit that champions the expression of faith. About two and a half years ago, Sister Dew said, the Radiant Foundation began exploring how faith is treated by the media.

“I’ve got piles and piles of articles where the national press has tried to talk about some facet [of] God or religion or faith ... and it has always felt distorted to me,” Sister Dew said, adding, “We set out to try to say, ‘Could we make a difference? Could our little company make a difference in how faith and people of faith ... are treated by various forms of media?’”

Helping Faith and Media Connect

It was with those questions in mind that Deseret Management Corporation launched the Faith & Media Initiative (FAMI). Because many of the media companies operated by DMC publish heavily on topics of faith, family and civic virtue, this project is attempting to better understand how to ensure accurate, balanced representation of all faiths in news and entertainment.

Sister Dew cited a Pew Research Center study that found 84% of humankind identifies with religion. Based upon this fact, FAMI launched several global studies. One of those used artificial intelligence to scrape data from more than 30 million online documents. FAMI also contracted with HarrisX to conduct a global study of more than 10,000 respondents in 18 countries.

Some findings are sobering. For instance, 63% of faith stories are negative, sensational or divisive, and only 20% of journalists feel they understand the nuances of faith.

Sister Dew pointed to an increasingly secular society, including newsrooms, as part of the challenge — it can be difficult to find people of faith, and thus people who understand faith, in journalism. Many editors seem to prioritize faith stories only if there’s scandal or trauma involved, she said.

Additionally, tough newsroom economics has led to many religion reporting positions getting the axe. For the journalists who are left behind, “there’s a fear of getting it wrong, and religion has become politicized in many settings. ... So [if] a person who doesn’t believe in faith tries to write about faith, that’s just foreign territory completely to them.”

Religions could help themselves a little more in that regard, Sister Dew said — providing credible spokespeople or everyday people willing to speak about their faith could help journalists see that there’s an audience for a wider range of religious stories.

To help create a news industry conducive to faith stories, Sister Dew said FAMI has trained over 1,300 journalists at places like the Columbia School of Journalism, the National Press Club, the Google News Lab in Mexico City and more.

The Initiative has also participated in major business and media gatherings in New York City, London and Abu Dhabi. Sister Dew said they’ve had conversations with Forbes about the importance of acknowledging organizations and individuals that incorporate faith into their businesses.

She recalled a conversation with Seth Cohen, chief impact officer at Forbes, in which FAMI leaders asked why Forbes cares about faith. His response was, “Well, you’ve made us care.”

“It’s surprising how many individuals there are ... working for major brands or [for] people of influence, who resonate with a message of saying, ‘We’ve got to do better. We can do better,’” Sister Dew said.

Linking Arms With Other Believers

Sister Dew closed by telling a story about a visit to the Vatican several summers ago. While there, she had the pleasure of sitting next to Sister Patricia Murray at dinner.

Known as “Sister Pat” among Catholics, the now 76-year-old Irishwoman is sometimes called “the most influential woman in the Catholic church,” Sister Dew said. Sister Pat is currently the executive secretary at the International Union of Superiors General, a Catholic organization representing about 600,000 sisters and nuns from 80 countries worldwide.

Sister Dew said at the end of their “delightful” conversation, Sister Pat asked her, “Who would have thought we would have so much in common?”

Sister Dew responded by acknowledging that while neither of them was likely to convert to the other’s religion, they had something in common bigger than any of their differences.

“And that is [that] we both feel accountable to God. ... For both of us, we believe that Jesus Christ makes all the difference in our lives,” Sister Dew said.

She said that Latter-day Saints need to have “a profound willingness” to talk about what matters most to them. This goes beyond preaching the gospel in compelling ways — it means linking arms with other believers, whatever their specific religions may be, and being willing to celebrate fellow believers.

“Whether it’s our little organization trying to influence Forbes, or any of us trying to influence others by the way we live, by what we post online... or by what we do in our circle of influence, it seems to me that it behooves all of us... to figure out how to talk about [faith] in a way that is natural and inviting,” Sister Dew said.

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