Wednesday, August 16, 2006

MeChurch

I absolutely cannot stop laughing.

Thanks to Jana for sending this via email.

Update:

I just caught sight of the tag: IngniterMedia. Obviously, this fauxmercial is a parody of hyper-accomodating churches in general, but "IgniterMedia" does seem to be a reference to the United Methodist Church's current ad campaign, produced by Igniting Ministries. If you'd like to watch some of those spots, try here.

I actually like some of these. Or, rather, there are two things that strike me as "not as awful as I feared" about some of these.

One, they are precisely not the sort of commercials the spot above is parodying. Watch "The Gift." A woman goes all over her town, leaving various-sized packages in a number of different locations. After giving away numerous gifts (some hard to deliver), she comes home and is surprised to find a medium-sized package on her own doorstep. The voiceover proclaims, "If you're looking for ways to share your gifts with others, and possibly even receive something in return, . . . " (and so on). I think that's a vision of a real church. Sure, it doesn't mention Jesus. (Ok, so that's a big problem.) But it doesn't picture church as a place where "it's all about you."

Two, they are also not the commercials that the UCC is currently running. I've only seen one of them, but it sickened me. It "worked" by a harsh, thinly-veiled criticism of other churches and denominations, proudly proclaiming, "We're better than they." That was truly repugnant. (Oh, and that one also failed to mention Jesus, didn't it?)

I think IgniterMedia's next fauxmercial should parody that commercial. "MeChurch. We're better than everybody else."

2 comments:

H said...

Oh. My. Word.

That is hilarious!

Now *I* can't stop laughing!

Unknown said...

And isn't that they way we are being suggested to run church these days.

Thanks,
Abi