Responsible journalism has a standard — one that matters most when emotions run high. After 9/11, news organizations were careful to separate Islam from the extremists who claimed to act in its name. That distinction became a bedrock norm: separate a faith from those who weaponize it. The question raised by CNN’s recent documentary on “Christian nationalism” is whether that standard still applies when the faith in question is Christianity.

The most powerful part of a documentary is rarely what it proves. It’s what it implies.