The up side is that everyone gets to try reporting on religion, which—given the salience of faith, the quest for community, the search for meaning and the hunger for purpose—is front and center in most stories. Why is Haiti hit by a earthquake? Can we talk to chimps? What turns a middle-class American Muslim into a jihadist? How to explain Tiger Woods' behavior? Religion is science, politics, sports and, of course, acts of God.

Some may say that by attenuating the meaning of religion—shifting so far from institutions, theology and authorities, I've made the word meaningless—everything is religion. But according to some traditions, everything—from Tiger's misdeeds to the Haitian calamity—is in God's hands. According to others, the way we live our lives, conduct our business and raise our children is the very essence of a religious worldview. In short, everything is religious.

Take the web. At a conference last week on Islam and the Media, syndicated columnist Mona Eltahawy said that after moving to the U.S. she was unable to find a simpatico Muslim community until she discovered the Muslim WakeUp site (now defunct). Eltahawy was seconding scholar Gary Bunt's observation that the Internet has transformed the way Muslims see the world.

Most media coverage has focused on how Islamic terrorists use the web for transnational recruitment. But Bunt also is interested in how cyberspace affects religious practice, authority and representation. The web challenges religious hierarchies, creates new communities and enables users to try out new identities. Social media not only facilitates religion—it becomes part of religion. I'm not saying the web is a religion, or even that it is religious in a woo-woo way; rather, as the mediums through which religion occurs, cyberspace and social media are integral to how, what and why practice and identity are constructed.

There's not one story here; they're many. How has the web affected religious authority, what's the impact of online democratization on practice and community, has the web accelerated a crazy-quilt religious marketplace and, if so, what's the effect on traditional religious institutions, does the web's pervasive commercialization (ads anyone?) further commodify religion? All this goes unnoticed by most of the legacy media. Yes, it's great to read in-depth reports on the megachurches' growing racial sensitivity or the new microchurch phenomena. But like print media itself, religion coverage that sticks to physical plants and traditional institutions is oh-so-20th-century.

Diane Winston