Marketing faith

A few years ago, I was working as a Creative Director at a technology-based advertising agency. It was an unlikely company as very few people— like, ten out of 400— had any experience or even interest in the advertising business. Most of the employees came out of film or technology or sales or somebody’s personal phone list and had signed on with the sure promise of being millionaires by the end of the year. There seemed to be no basic understanding of marketing or strategy or the American consumer; when I heard one day that we had an in for a pitch with General Mills, I had to explain to several key executives what General Mills was and why securing business with them might be a good thing for growing the company.

In my final month there, I got wind through one of the sales people that we had been invited to pitch the national business for the Presbyterian church. I offered to attend the meeting. “I speak that language,” I told him cryptically. “I think I can help.” The air between us suddenly felt charged. I sensed that I had gone out on a limb. I had never made an issue of my Christian faith before at work; it was a flagrantly secular company, which was why I thought it important for me to be at the meeting.

My offer ended up being misconstrued in more ways than I will ever know. My boss accused me of every sort of deception. Although it was understood that I was to handle all new business pitches and particularly businesses with large “franchise” possibilities, and although I spoke to sales people and made plans for meetings every day, somehow the issue of religion had cast my actions in a different light. I tried to explain why the pitch was even important. “Churches are a perfect model for creating a national TV message with a localized tag. It’s exactly what our company is set up to do. I know if I go to the meeting I can get us the business. They’ll recognize that they’re in safe hands.”

There was no indication that he appreciated the gesture. “I can’t believe there are that many Presbyterian churches,” he said curtly. “I want to see a number on my desk by this afternoon.”

“10,000,” I replied, pointing to my desktop. I’d already begun researching some of the nuances of the denomination that morning. This enormous number seemed as foreign to him as the idea that Americans ate breakfast cereal and spend lots of money on it. In California’s “film-technology-cultural complex” it is a point of pride not to even know about what the rest of America is doing. I remember trying to find creative teams to work on projects for both the NFL and the NHL and young men rolling their eyes (through hipper-than-though glasses) as if the idea of professional sports was offensive to them. I tried to educate my boss. “There’s a great history of ad campaigns for the church. In the 80s, the work being done for the Mormons won every creative award in the book. Last year the Methodists had a really cool campaign, too. I’m telling you, church marketing can lead to really great creative possibilities. The kind of work that’ll get us noticed.”

His blank stare twisted in on itself, confusion transitioning to dumbfoundedness. “What could a church possibly be marketing?”

I paused, considered how best to explain it. “Hope. Joy. Peace. A sense of purpose. A sense of belonging.” It felt, in that moment, like a testimony.

I was laid off the following week. Stunned, but ultimately, grateful. The scripture “Do not cast your pearls before swine,” came to mind.

Recently, as I began to solidify my plans to begin my MA in Theology, I found that the power of marketing faith played no small role. Faith without Mandate. That’s what it said on the website for Concordia University in Irvine. My first impression of Concordia— formed over a decade ago— was that it was a small, regional, Lutheran college; small, as in narrow, small as in limited. In all my grandiosity, I had imagined I would need to study theology expansively, without limits, without the blinders of any particular denomination. I had considered Fuller and Claremont; I had looked at Biola and Azusa Pacific. I had even flirted with the idea of commuting up to Berkeley as another friend had done. Long before I even knew or understood or admitted that I would make theology my heart’s desire, I had searched every Christian university website in the Pacific north and southwest. Every one of them required a “faith statement” —- basically, a statement where a person attempts to say what precisely, exactly, they believe in a language that will be approved by those in charge. Although I’d come to accept it as necessary, everything about this requirement felt wrong to me.

I can’t say for certain when Concordia began using the slogan Faith without Mandate or its tagline “Developing wise, honorable, and cultivated citizens.” I had looked at their site 100 times and never noticed it before this summer. The Holy Spirit is funny that way, revealing things at just the right time. As I filled out my application, the only statement I was required to make was a short explanation of why I’d chosen Concordia and what I hoped to do with my degree. In other words, they were willing to give me the best of what they have to offer, of what they have learned and believed to be true about what it means to follow Christ, about how to apply myself rigorously towards understanding matters of theology in a more profound and purposeful way, but how those teachings take root in me, how scholarship emboldens my faith, what I enter— or walk away— believing is between me and God. Deep in my heart I knew that this is how it should be.

I was reminded of how important this idea of faith without mandate was to me again just last week when I read that Governor Perry had spent a weekend retreating privately with 200 evangelical church leaders for the purpose of giving his faith statement. Of having it vetted. Of making promises about how that faith would translate into action, running mates, platforms. Now, I have no idea what Governor Perry believes. He may be a true saint. He may be an ordinary guy who’s smart enough to know how much money a presidential bid takes. He may be evil incarnate. I really couldn’t say. But I believe there’s something very wrong about a person using his claim to faith to buy votes. Maybe I was guilty of the very same thing when I offered to try to win business with my “Christian credentials.” Maybe those of us who walk down this road and find themselves, on occasion, on the front lines, need an extra measure of protection from our lesser angels.

When it comes to marketing faith, may we try to remember that Christ himself wrote the manual of best practices 2000 years ago: “…let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16)