I was a journalist, and I still work in related fields, as a Catholic Religious Brother. The media enjoys a certain immunity going after Major figures and organizations. I can certainly agree that it looks like the Catholic Church is getting the majority of bad press while school districts and smaller denominations recieve minimal coverage.
There is some balance in matters of size in order. More than half of the media reported abuse does not involve the church.
Please slow down before responding to that claim. Becasue the other cases of abuse are in groups of much smaller size and geographic coverage are, it only appears they are not getting the same coverage. A case concerning the Minnesota Lutheran Synod affects far fewer people than alomost any single Catholic diocese in the USA. It gets reported on the front page of the local area. And it is reported on in a number of other medias, but with smaller attention.
The Boy Scouts of America made national Headlines for a good many years some decades ago. They had wide spread abuse and cover up. They adopted proceedures to check this. Today, the abuse still happens, but very localized.
Well over half of the abuse, however, is inside of families. This hits the news, but ussualy local — if it is discovered at all.
Mormons come under media scruiteny a lot also. Far less than RC Catholics - but again it has to do with the influence the two different churches have in this land. RC is very influential just on population. RC is involved in far more community benefitial projects than any other denomination, again party due to size.
Although we recieve “some” bashing on pro-life/pro-choice issues, we come out pretty goo in the long run when we are in the news trying to protect our hospitals from evil pro-choice law regulating how our hospital are run and employee benefits are measured.
We are at the forefront of keeping immoral labor regulating laws from ever being enacted (eg abortion insurance). The media recognizes this. some media bashes us for it, some media defends us for it. Both types of media has shown the American Public that we are the champions of family rights and family issues. Many people of other denominatiuons, though still finacialy supporting thier particular faith communities, have donated to the Catholic church becasue what ever kind of media reporting there is one us, these folks know we will get the job done and that we are big enough to get it done - standing up against governmetn powers that need to be stood up to.