Error loading media: File could not be played
00:0000:0000:00
00:00
To the reporter, there was a jarring irony. The man accused of killing 11 Jews at a Pittsburgh synagogue was given critical care by Jewish doctors. But to Jeff Cohen, the Jewish president of the hospital, there was only a duty to care. “People say he’s evil,” Dr. Cohen told the reporter in a widely shared video. “He’s some mother’s son.”
In looking through the eyes of a mother, Cohen touched on something powerful. I’m reminded of a recent conversation with our Canada reporter, Sara Miller Llana. Speaking about how she approached reporting in areas gripped by violence and fear, she said “I always tried to connect with mothers (and fathers).” So often, she said, reporters go into these areas and report just on the bullets and the gangs. “But there are also mothers behind every closed door, raising kids, and for the most part doing the best job they can to keep those kids safe.”
Looking at the world that way changed the way she saw the world, she said. “It is so telling to me that every place I've been has always, without fail, been better, safer, more hopeful than what I imagined based on what I read in the media.”
That spirit, as Cohen said, is a duty to care for all, and it is not naive to recognize that the power it showed on a tragic day in Pittsburgh is always available.
Now, here are our five stories for today, with a look at a problem-solving insurgency in Congress, a humanitarian dilemma for Syrian refugees, and the message behind the world’s largest statue.
Our name is about honesty. The Monitor is owned by The Christian Science Church, and we’ve always been transparent about that.
The Church publishes the Monitor because it sees good journalism as vital to progress in the world. Since 1908, we’ve aimed “to injure no man, but to bless all mankind,” as our founder, Mary Baker Eddy, put it.
Here, you’ll find award-winning journalism not driven by commercial influences – a news organization that takes seriously its mission to uplift the world by seeking solutions and finding reasons for credible hope.
Explore values journalism About us