Heard about the Vatican’s announcement of “new” sins-with offenses like pollution and drug dealing to replace such passé infractions as gluttony and lust?

Well, not quite. As so often in the past, reporters have taken a bit of poetic license in their coverage of Vatican news. Catholic News Service has a thorough rundown of the brouhaha here.

The British press is often especially freewheeling when it comes to Pope-related stories.

London’s Telegraph in particular made the most of this one, with a headline reading “Recycle or go to Hell, warns Vatican,” and an online forum that yielded such proposed sins as “wearing sports clothes with no intention of going to the gym.”

Jim Martin over at America magazine has his take on why the media got it wrong, “neither of them malicious”:

First, a general unfamiliarity with the contemporary Catholic tradition of social sin, even though under Pope John Paul II something like “anti-Semitism” was often referred to in those terms. And, second, the fact that a headline that reads “Seven New Deadly Sins” is undeniably sexier than a headline saying, “Vatican Official Deepens Church’s Reflection on Longstanding Tradition of Social Sin.”