I can understand slanting the news about politics, but slanting news stories about the recent changes in the Catholic Mass suggests that the New York Times is just habitually perverse in slamming all things it thinks are "conservative."

TMATT at Get Religion did a word count on a recent NYT story about liturgical changes in the Mass. Here are his results:

Note that this debate is between Vatican leaders and a vague camp of critics, including ordinary priests. In reality, this is a debate INSIDE the American Catholic hierarchy and, especially, among conservative and progressive Catholic liturgists and academics. The essential question? Is a translation “simple” and “clear” if it omits many words, phrases and images that are found in the source document?

That’s the debate journalists need to cover. Thus, one would expect that this Times story must accurately and fairly cover this debate, with articulate leaders — local and national — being heard on both sides. That’s the journalistic challenge. Correct?

With that in mind, I went through the story with a highlighter pen and marked the voices on both sides, then I counted the words. I did everything I could to leave many words as neutral, including the following quote that allowed one Catholic to cover both bases at the same time:

Rebecca Brown, a parishioner at St. James Cathedral in Seattle, said she felt well prepared for the new translation. “I’m not fond of the linguistic choices, how it rolls off the tongue,” Ms. Brown said. “But on the other hand, the Catholic Church is always about renewal and reforming itself. This is just one of those changes.”

I am sure that others attempting this task and end up with numbers that are slightly different than mine. I erred on the side of neutrality, as I mentioned.

Nevertheless, I ended up with 128 words of positive commentary about the new translation and 403 words of negative commentary. The story includes one scholar on the left, but none on the right. When it comes to direct quotes, all of the strong voices are among those who oppose the new translation.

It’s not a fair fight. Then again, that does not appear to have been the journalistic goal — simply looking at the raw materials of the report. This is a story about good guys and bad guys, defenders of Vatican II and opponents of Vatican II.

In terms of balance and tone, here is a typical exchange:

“It was interesting,” said Danielle McGinley, 31, a parishioner at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in downtown Los Angeles. “It feels more like a Spanish Mass to me. The Spanish Mass is a more literal translation. I like it.”

But George Lind, 73, in New York, had a more visceral reaction. He tried to say the new language at the Church of the Holy Cross in Times Square during the Saturday night Mass, he said, but he became so angry that he had to stop speaking.

“I am so tired of being told exactly what I have to say, exactly what I have to pray,” he said. “I believe in God, and to me that is the important thing. This is some attempt on the part of the church hierarchy to look important.”

Yes, yes, there are conservative Catholics who would respond that they have, for four decades, been told exactly what they have to say, exactly what they have to pray. That’s the other side of the story, the other side of this emotional debate.

Do the journalistic math.