Questionable Advertising

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 2, 1910

Questionable Advertising

It is entirely proper for the Christian worker to bring his work before the public whom he expects to reach, but as his calling is of God, high and holy in character, so his methods should be befitting his profession. When we see ministers of the gospel descend to sensational catchpenny methods of bringing their ministry before the public, their work is at once lowered in the estimation of serious, sober-minded people. E. Braddock, in the Western Recorder of March 31, makes these excellent comments upon this questionable method of religious advertising:—

To-day from platform and press some misguided ministers are advocating the methods of the press agent of a theatrical company, or a new patent food. Resort is made to “eye-catching phrases” in advertising Sunday sermons; brass band parades before the services with torches; coffee and sandwiches as a postlude; hired professional singers and secular orators on secular topics. Here are a few such catchpenny phrases advertising Sunday sermons in a metropolitan paper: “The Fall Frosts,” “The Chelsea Fire,” “Cure for the Blues,” “Old-Fashioned Spring Fever,” and always the ubiquitous reminder of the “special singing.” The mind of the public is drawn and directed

only to those things which the lusts crave and hunger for, and it appears as if the minister’s sole ambition was to discover some means of satisfying the passion for excitement with things that do excite. Is this the minister’s mission?—Nay, it is his duty to seize this inordinate passion as one of the manifestations of sin, and treat it with the Word of God. He is to remember that men shall be lovers of self more than lovers of God. The crowd that is attracted by catchpenny methods will have to be held by catchpenny sermons, and that minister will evolve into a performing monkey, and his church into a circus.

Sensational methods accomplish but little for the cause of Christ. The gospel preached in faith and simplicity is the one means by which souls may be truly converted.