Thousands Flock to Jesus’ Home Page in British MySpace Campaign
“Where will you find him?”, asks the advertisement showing the face of Jesus formed by the leftover foam in an empty beer glass. It’s part of a campaign that debuted in December by the Churches Advertising Network (CAN), an agency that serves local Christian denominations in England and runs promotional campaigns centered around holidays and special events.
The Jesus Beer Glass iconography, supported by print, radio and Internet ads, directed users to Jesus’ MySpace page, which contains information about the campaign and a couple of long blog-comment conversations. Jesus, apparently, is a single 33-year-old ex-carpenter from Nazareth. The campaign struck late last year, and since early December, Jesus’ MySpace profile received 57,000 page views.
“For many, Christmas is just drinking and partying and God is excluded, yet many young people are interested in finding deeper meaning and exploring faith,” said CAN chairman Francis Goodwin in an interview with The Sun. “We hope the link to MySpace will offer another venue for them to discuss their feelings and debate the issues.”
The MySpace page also contained a link to “Jesus’ official home page,” a site containing a news and opinion blog, and information about Christianity and great Christian figures that mesh with British culture like William Wilberforce, the British politician who successfully campaigned to abolish the slave trade in the early 1800’s. 2007 is the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the British slave trade. Thousands visited the website due to the holiday Beer Glass campaign, which ran through December, according to British religious newspaper Christian Today.
Jesus continues to have more friends added to his MySpace page at a rate of about 12 a day, according to Goodwin.
The CAN has run controversial ads in the past, including one that depicting Jesus in the guise of communist revolutionary Che Guevara.
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