The Divine Commodity

Leadership Journal Winter 2008 issue

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It’s an eye-catching cover and snappy title: Shopping for God. But page one reads, “This book is not about God.” The discrepancy between cover and content, between the pitch and the product, is what James Twitchell has built his career upon. A professor of advertising at the University of Florida, he knows even the most sacred things have been reduced to commodities in our consumer culture.

Twitchell is a self-confessed “cold Christian” and “apatheist,” someone who cares little about his own faith. But he is interested in “how religious sensation is currently being manufactured, branded, packaged, shipped out, and consumed.”

What can church leaders gain here? A lot. Most of what we read about ministry leadership, outreach, and management is infused with a heavy dose of spiritual language—including the content of this fine journal. Twitchell propels the pendulum the other way. By removing God language, he asserts that most of what we assume to be fueled by divine power may actually be the result of market forces.

"The term Stockholm Syndrome first occurred in 1973 at an attempted bank robbery in Stockholm, Sweden. A man tried to rob a bank, and the police caught him inside. He took three female hostages and one male hostage and held them for 131 hours, during which time he terrorized them. He fired his Russian automatic assault weapon at them. He threatened to kill them on numerous occasions. He put nooses around their necks and threatened to hang them. But he didn't harm any of them. "When he finally surrendered, something very unusual happened. We expected the hostages to be antagonistic toward the hostage taker. But instead they said they feared the police more than the hostage taker. They also said they didn't hate the hostage taker. They refused to testify against him. One of the ladies became engaged to this hostage taker, and as far as I know, she's still engaged to him. "The FBI analyzed thousands of hostage situations since that time. We found this happens very frequently. So we asked psychologists, 'What happened? What causes this?' They said in hostage situations, with a high level of life-threatening stress and positive human interaction, the people's ego-defensive mechanisms come into play. There is denial of what is happening and regression to a different emotional state. The hostage will eventually begin to transfer his hatred; This guy doesn't really want to hurt me; and begins to hate the policemen. And something else very important begins to happen; a love relationship begins to take place. And this love relationship is like what happens between a young child and a mother. The mother is protecting the child from the terrifying world and providing all its needs. This love relationship occurs both ways. "One of the most outstanding examples occurred in Holland in the seventies. A group of terrorists captured a whole trainload of people. They made demands on the Dutch government. The Dutch government did not come through, so they began to murder people. They murdered two on the first day, and the second day, they selected a man by the name of Garrard Votters. They brought him out and said, 'Say your prayers. You're going to die.' And he said, 'Okay, but before I die, there's a man here that knows my family. I'd like to give him a message.' Of course the South Moluccans wanted to listen in. He said, 'I feel my life has been a failure.' He wanted to tell his wife he was sorry. He went on and on about his problems. He became a real human being instead of just a symbol to be executed. The Moluccans were unable to execute him. I've seen it happen many times." Shopping for God: How Christianity Went from in Your Heart to in Your Face by James B. Twitchell Simon & Schuster, 2007 336 pp., $17.99

For example, based on research he says, “Chances are that if you go to your church and see a hymnal or a pew Bible in the rack in front of you, you are seeing the end of your church in the distance.”

Commenting on mainline churches where over half the members are women over 60, Twitchell writes, “As any advertiser will tell you, when you see this demographic, you are not looking down the barrel, you have already swallowed the bullet.”

With the precision of an academic and the wit of a humorist, Twitchell covers both historical and contemporary church issues. Like, how has the First Amendment impacted church competition? And even the origins of the ubiquitous altar call and church sign with movable type. He explains how the largest churches thrive by appealing to men.

Perhaps most helpful is Twitchell’s explanation of the economic concepts of branding. He writes, “While thinking about believers as customers seems almost too vulgar, thinking about consumers as believers is precisely what modern marketing is all about.” Purchases determine identity. Church leaders can’t afford to ignore the effects of living in a consumer culture. Today, the way people choose a church is almost the same as how they shop for groceries.

In 1955 only 4 percent of people moved away from the church of their parents. In 1980 it was 30 percent. Today it’s 50 percent. According to Twitchell, “Religion is a choice pretending to be a calling.” And the fastest growing denominations are those focused on selling their product (via outreach) because “The value of the next sale (the convert) proves the value of the previous sale (yours).”

No discussion of the American church scene would be complete without an exploration of the megachurch phenomenon. This is where Twitchell provides his most irreverent but eye-opening analysis. In a chapter titled, “The Megachurch: ‘If You are Calling about a Death in the Family, Press 8,'” he chronicles how just 10 churches drawing more than 2,000 people in 1970 has mushroomed to over 1,200 megachurches today. At the same time, 50 small churches a week are closing their doors.

With a chicken and egg argument, Twichell writes, “Megas concentrate on what makes the brand powerful: growth. What you sell is the perception that whatever it is that you are selling is in demand.”

But Shopping for God ends on an ominous note: “Slowly but surely ‘this is not your father’s church’ is well on its way to becoming your father’s church” not only because the next generation won’t accept the mega brand, but also because the “pastorpreneurs” that launched them are mavericks, impossible to replace. The same market forces that created the megachurch may ultimately be its undoing.

Shopping for God is an illuminating and entertaining read, but be forewarned: Twitchell is not seeking to encourage pastors, and his irreverence will certainly bother you at times. But if you are looking for an outsider’s perspective, and if you have a thicker skin than most, I highly recommend his book.

Satisfaction is guaranteed.

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