Theology on the tube

[kaberett]

There's a series of ads running at the moment with straplines to the tune of "GOD KNEW YOU WOULD SEE THIS", and some smaller blurb about how it's a Christian dating website, isn't that amazing, God also knew that you'd want to date another Christian, etc etc etc.

... and, of course, it's a service for which you have to pay in order to get any use out of it.

Now, I might be unduly prejudiced due to being an embittered ex-Catholic, but the thing this reminds me of most of all is the merchants Jesus drove out of the temple, to the extent that I am uncomfortable about these ads primarily because of a creeping sense that they are contra-Biblical and contra-What Would Jesus Do. And therefore really skeevy and kinda blasphemous.

TELL ME YOUR THOUGHTS, o readership, should you so desire...

Comments

[jelazakazone]

I am not now nor have I ever been Christian. I grew up in the US South (not quite the Bible Belt) and Fundamentalist Christians were a dime a dozen. They NEVER struck me as being properly Christian from what I could understand about Christianity and this sort of thing is just the thing they'd go for.

For the record, dh's grandmother was a Christian and the classiest lady I ever met. She skipped church for us. I think it was the only time in her life she did missed church. I didn't even know about it until later.

So, yeah. I often feel that things that are done in "Jesus"'s name are not really done in his name.

[happydork]

Disclaimer: I am not Christian.

I saw those ads today for the first time, and my first thought was that they read like they were written by non-Christians trying to attract members of a rare and exotic religion they'd read about but never seen firsthand.

[worlds_of_smoke]

Yeah, it's pretty non-Christian to ask for money for that sort of things. But a lot of people who identify as Christian aren't really Christian at all, but are rather Xtian/fundie.

[liv]

Obviously not Christian, and I agree entirely the dating site ads are creeeeeepy. I do worry about the line of argument that goes, well, Jesus drove the money-changers out of the Temple, so you mustn't pollute religion with icky money, so everybody has to put lots of labour into servicing the Christian community without expecting to get paid. And somehow it's always women and low-status people who get compared to the money-changers if they should dare to mention anything about compensation. [There are equivalent Jewish stories people hide behind to get out of actually paying anyone for their labour.]

I think it could be theologically acceptable to run a Christian dating site and charge money for it, just like it's theologically acceptable to actually pay the builders and artists who build and beautify and repair churches. But it's also very likely that this particular site is trying to screw money out of people by exploiting their religious feelings.

[atreic]

Also, Christianity is not about not paying people to do things. We pay vicars! The money lenders in the temple is an example of people using the house of God to make money - Jesus says 'My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves' So I think it's entirely consistent (and fairly standard) to read the episode not as Jesus disapproves of people doing work and making money, but of them using space that should be holy to God to do it. You _could_ argue that a Christian dating site is a place consecrated as holy to God, but, err, I wouldn't.

[kaberett]

Right, I don't think people shouldn't make money out of doing work! I'm just... staggeringly uncomfortable with this particular invocation of a god's omniscience in the aims of... more money.

[catyak]

Isn't that sort of how the Protestant religions started? With a notice stuck on the church door complaining about the Pope effectively offering people the chance to get into Heaven if they paid up now?

It's years since anyone inflicted any of this stuff on me (i.e. RE at school) so I might have mis-remembered.

[pretty_panther]

*nods* Can't add anything to what Liv has said, really.

[shanaqui]

I saw those ads when I was in London! It seems... exploitative and twisty.

[onyxlynx]

Yah.

My telling myself "God wants me to be with X" is one thing (and probably wrong and willful stupidity, but I digress).

A dating site (OK, threw up a little) with that message? Charging a fee? I'm pretty sure medieval theologians had a name for something like that. I'm just going to shriek "Noooooooooo!!! and run away ASAP because I smell brimstone.

[fyreharper]

:appreciates your icon:

[onyxlynx]

Thanks! elz had made a bunch of them, but last time I looked they were gone.

[jack]

A brief google suggests they may actually be somewhat legitimate: http://www.christianconnection.co.uk/about

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Connection_(website)

There's not much information, that might be bogus, but at first glance it looks like a specific organisation, not just a fill-in-the-blanks template-website "Dating site for X" which is the usual scam.

So I don't know, I agree the advert is ill-thought out, but it's not clear to me if it's an actual scam, or completely legitimate, or somewhere between.

[kaberett]

Oh, I don't think it's a scam - I just think it's theologically inconsistent.

[jack]

Mm. But if it were a scam, it would be a fair analogy to how moneychangers-in-the-temple are usually seen[1]-- people unfairly using God to get money out of people.

But if not, is it any worse than Christian bricklayers, etc?

Conversely, I agree "God knew you would see this" is, um, dodgy, but I hope most people would not take it very literally.

[1] Whether or not that's an accurate description of what the money-changers actually did, I don't know.

[kaberett]

Hmm, I don't think I think Christian-specific dating sites as a paid service is inherently Dodgy, apparently - it's specifically the way they're being advertised.

[rysmiel]

Gosh. That reminds me of one of the many excellent scenes in Jesus de Montreal, where a bunch of slimy types making a beer ad get the thrown-out-of-the-temple treatment.

(That was my favourite film ever even before I moved to Montreal; it's now even more so, now that I see how brilliantly it makes use of non-obvious traits of real locations. I would strongly recommend it to you.)

[steorra]

I'm an active Christian. It makes me uncomfortable. Claiming "Hey, look, here's what God says, and what he wants for you life - pay us"? Highly presumptuous.

Not having the most mind right now, but basically, yeah.

[steorra]

See also second item mentioned in this post of mine from 2010: Things on facebook that bother me [Locked post]
(Note that first item discusses an event promoting apparently non-consensual touch.)

[damerell]

If God meant for me - er, J. Random Christian - to get lai^W married, wouldn't They just put my potential spouse in the seat opposite, rather than arranging for me to see an ad for a dating site? Perhaps I am overanalysing.

[fyreharper]

I have skepticism of anyone trying to tell me What God Wants Me To Do. Especially if it benefits them.

Have not seen these, ads, so am going from your description, but as to the "God knew you would see this!" - well, yes, if we assume an omniscient God, then of course that follows. But that is an entirely different thing from "God endorses this message!" so I'm rather left going "...yeah? and your point? What does that have to do with anything?"

[redbird]

My thoughts are that if there's such a thing as a god, and if it cares who I date or marry, it also knows how to reach me directly. It wouldn't need to go through this third party.

[ursamajor]

I am long-enough ex-Catholic that I find that dating site's hypocrisy hilarious, rather than infuriating. At least as long as I don't think about the people who do get swayed by their arguments because they don't actually know enough about their religion's primary documents.

[ewx]

I have a problem with the idea of saying one kind of self-identified Christian is a proper Christian and some other kind isn't (ditto other religions). Though I've no idea how the people behind this dating site actually self-identify.

[silveradept]

I thought predestination went out with Calvin. And am doubly annoyed at the insistence that God wants Christians to date Christians and that he apparently wants them to do so through having to pay at a dating site. For an entity presumably composed of love for their creation, that's pretty limiting.

Place your cross on the ballot paper

[hairyears]

There's a certain type of business executive who thinks that 'Jesus' is great branding, and 'Christians' are an homogeneous target group responding to Jesus-based branding cues in a predictable and profitable way.

Such luminaries (or benightiaries) 'have no more religion than my horse' but can internalise the contradiction by self-labelling as 'Christian' and self-identifying with a selective reading of bible stories that appeals to their self-worth.

Most, of course, come to the game preconditioned: it remains only to rationalise the brand-appropriation, and that's always easy when the consequences are monetary gain and a sense of virtue.

Meanwhile, prominent self-identified Christians in politics actively campaign for confiscations from the poor, wageless labour, the denial of care to the sick, and violence against the vulnerable - and are praised by the press and the public for their vision and virtue. Accommodating the profit motive is, perhaps, the least damaging of the rationalisations in 'Performative Christianity'.

[shewhostaples]

I have been seeing those. I can't really take them seriously, and have various reactions, depending on my mood:

- mild irritation (pretty much for the reasons you mention above)
- 'and God also knows I'm married... is there a poly section?'
- '... what about a Christian women seeking Christian women section?'
- amusement that they quite often show up directly opposite the Stonewall one (I know Stonewall are less than ideal, but it's quite funny) showing two priests with the 'one of these is gay' strapline

On the whole, though, I've been trying to let go of worrying about how other people do Christianity, except where it is actively harmful, and I think I see these as silly and theologically dubious (to say the least) but not something that it's worth my getting angry about.

[shewhostaples]

... which doesn't touch on your point about the money aspect at all, because I hadn't looked that closely at the thing. I do think that's skeevy, yes, and in the unlikely event that someone asked me, as a Christian, to be involved in that sort of business, I would decline with some force. But I tend to feel that way about most dating sites, so...

[bjh21.me.uk]

I was in London at the weekend and noticed a couple of other adverts in that series, and what I noticed was that they referred to Christians in the third person. I can't remember the precise wording, but it talked about what "they" believe, which gave the impression that neither the writer nor the intended audience was Christian, which seemed a bit odd.