This area of religious journalism reflects the theological, social, and political point of view of a particular confession on the world order in general, or a similar point of view of a group of believers who identify themselves with a particular confession.
It is sufficient for a journalist to declare his or her confessional affiliation as determining his or her worldview and method of analyzing the world in order to be considered engaged in confessional journalism.
This definition helps to eliminate the contradictions that have taken place in recent years in the journalistic and confessional milieus, in which attempts to create unions of confessional (Orthodox, Islamic, Protestant, Catholic, etc.) journalists met with rejection and misunderstanding both in society and in the confessional milieu.
Doubts were expressed about the permissibility of the existence of confessional journalism as such, and suggestions were made about the speculative nature of such journalistic associations.
To question the right of journalists to associate along denominational lines is like questioning the right of people to publicly express their political views and to associate on the basis of communist, liberal, conservative, or other beliefs.
Of course, in this case, the union of confessional journalists inevitably acquires the character of an intellectual club based on rigid ideological (in this case, confessional-religious) principles. But who is to say that in a democratic society, such an association of journalists is forbidden or has no right to exist? On the contrary, the state and society should welcome such attempts to consolidate the intellectual efforts of journalists united on the basis of a time-tested and, as a rule, widely known and sometimes even popular worldview.
Every person who declares his or her confessional affiliation has the freedom to follow or not follow the canonical and dogmatic rules of confessional life to the extent to which he or she understands them and considers them obligatory for himself or herself.
The freedom to declare one’s religion or denominational affiliation, a freedom enjoyed by everyone on its territory, applies no less to the journalist.
A journalist has the right to identify himself as a confessional (Orthodox, Catholic, Islamic, Protestant, etc.) journalist even if he is in conflict with the canonical leadership of a confession recognized by the State or society.
Another thing is that, in this case, a confessional journalist is obliged, in order not to mislead society, to indicate a specific affiliation with a religious organization and in no case to speak on behalf of a religious organization to which he does not belong.