Jonathan M. Pitts
Jonathan M. Pitts writes about religion, sports, music, medicine and the military – and anything else that touches on the human spirit -- for the Baltimore Sun. Since joining the paper in 1999, he has covered oyster shuckers and opera singers, Deadheads and D-Day vets, sauerkraut and the Scriptures and more, always seeking the enduring in the everyday. The co-author of Baseball Hall of Famer Whitey Herzog’s memoir, “You’re Missin’ a Great Game,” he’s a native of St. Louis and a graduate of Haverford College and the University of Missouri School of Journalism
Recent Articles
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Inside Rev. Jamal Bryant's final Sunday at Baltimore's Empowerment Temple: Joy, tears, humor
When the Rev. Jamal H. Bryant took to the pulpit for his final day of services in Baltimore on Sunday, he says, he had no idea how things were going to turn out. Half his congregation at the Empowerment Temple, the AME church he founded in West Baltimore in 2000, seemed upset at his recent decision...
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10 questions with the Rev. Jamal H. Bryant on the eve of his farewell sermon at Empowerment Temple
When New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Ga., announced last month that the Rev. Jamal H. Bryant would become its new senior pastor, the news hit hard at Empowerment Temple, the AME church Bryant founded in 2000 and has built into a local force among African-American congregations....
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Bringing light into darkness: Public menorahs throughout Baltimore area seen as symbols of hope for Hanukkah
Outside a volunteer firehouse in northern Baltimore County, dozens of people will gather Sunday night for a ceremony that brings to life an old Jewish proverb: A little bit of light pushes away a lot of darkness. Shalom Zirkind, an Orthodox rabbi, will preside over the lighting of a 12-foot-tall...
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Turkey, goodwill, help with jobs all on menu at Thanksgiving dinner
Tanya Carroll’s 21-month-old grandson, Dallas Baker, was diagnosed with lead poisoning as a baby, a condition she says left him less than interested in eating for several worrisome weeks. But the cheerful toddler’s appetite didn’t seem to be much of a problem Wednesday. Dallas, of East Baltimore,...
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Rev. Jamal Bryant said to be leaving Baltimore's Empowerment Temple for Atlanta's New Birth Missionary Church
The Rev. Jamal H. Bryant, the charismatic, politically connected and at times controversial founding pastor of the Empowerment Temple AME Church in Baltimore, will become the new senior pastor at a well-known megachurch near Atlanta, an official of the Georgia church confirmed Monday. Bryant will...
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U.S. Catholic bishops to return to Baltimore after fall conference that failed to take action on abuse crisis
The nation’s conference of Catholic bishops announced Wednesday that it will return to Baltimore in June for an assembly as leaders grapple with a sex abuse crisis that has engulfed the church in the United States. The move represents a change in plans for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops,...
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Some Catholic bishops urge conference to reach consensus on sex abuse crisis in American church
A psychologist who works with clergy sex abuse victims told the nation’s Catholic bishops Tuesday that the key to solving the crisis now facing the church in the United States and around the world is to focus on victims first. “We need to listen to those who have been harmed, to those who have...
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At insistence of Vatican, U.S. bishops meeting in Baltimore won't vote on actions to address sex abuse crisis
The president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops opened its conference in Baltimore Monday by saying that at the “insistence” of the Vatican, the American clerics would not vote as planned on steps to address a sex abuse crisis that has reached the highest levels of the church in the United...