Do me a favor today, folks, and say a prayer for Jill Caroll, the 28-year-old journalist who is being held hostage in Iraq by madmen who are threatening to kill her shortly even though she has never done anything to them. Of all the people to kidnap, I am always mystified when journalists and aid workers are taken. Why hurt people who only came to tell the rest of the world your story or to help you? But I realize it's more complicated than that.

I would never be brave enough to go and do what Jill Carroll was doing in Iraq, but as a journalist, I understand the set of principles that led her to do so, and I am praying for her safe return. Please join me in prayer, even if that's not something you normally do.

And if you want to, click here to read a very good column written by a Chicago journalist about this situation. I know that the news media isn't always viewed as the best or most upright aspect of modern culture, but I think this is a good opportunity to remember that really, "the news media" is just a bunch of people, most of whom do what they do because they believe that, as Mulder says on the X-files, "The truth is out there." Or, to quote a better source, "You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free." (John 8:32.)