{"id":224,"date":"2006-03-23T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-03-23T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/does-jesus-need-pr.html"},"modified":"2006-03-23T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2006-03-23T12:00:00","slug":"does-jesus-need-pr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/does-jesus-need-pr.html","title":{"rendered":"Does Jesus Need P.R.?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div>\n<p>Did somebody say \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/blogs\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/what-passion-effect.html\">Passion Effect<\/a>\u201d? A <a href=\"http:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2006\/03\/16\/news\/companies\/faith_film\/\">recent CNN piece<\/a> claims the greatest boon of Mel\u2019s \u201cThe Passion of the Christ\u201d fell not to Christian filmmakers but to two Christian P.R. firms that help Hollywood navigate church basements to market their movies to the faithful. For its recent release &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/narnia\">The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe<\/a>,&#8221; CNN explains, Disney hired California-based Motive Marketing, which &#8220;designed and maintained an extensive &#8216;faith and family outreach&#8217; marketing effort, while Grace Hill Media handled the movie&#8217;s grassroots publicity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Most Christian media endeavors are treated as suspect\u2014when they are not subliminally trying to convert the public, they are moneychangers in the Temple. And the article has Paul Lauer, president of Motive Marketing, defending the idea of doing p.r. for Jesus: \u201cThe company&#8217;s goal isn&#8217;t about marketing movies as much as providing congregations with tools to further their goals.\u201d Motive, he points out, provided study guides for church groups and teachers for both \u201cNarnia\u201d and Mel\u2019s \u201cPassion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Don\u2019t discount the importance of these firms, however. Not only are Lauer and the folks at Grace Hill relentless and sharp (Lauer was behind the masterly marketing of \u201cThe Passion\u201d), Christian P.R. is crucial to the rise of Christian-oriented entertainment. Hollywood execs have long realized that the evangelical market is out there; but until they can reach it and move it, they aren\u2019t likely to cater to it. As Motive and Grace Hill prove their worth, the suits will be more comfortable green-lighting faith-based films, creating the long-awaited &#8220;Passion Effect.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div style=\"clear:both;padding-bottom:0.25em\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Did somebody say \u201cPassion Effect\u201d? A recent CNN piece claims the greatest boon of Mel\u2019s \u201cThe Passion of the Christ\u201d fell not to Christian filmmakers but to two Christian P.R. firms that help Hollywood navigate church basements to market their movies to the faithful. For its recent release &#8220;The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":275,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Does Jesus Need P.R.?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/does-jesus-need-pr.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Does Jesus Need P.R.?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Did somebody say \u201cPassion Effect\u201d? A recent CNN piece claims the greatest boon of Mel\u2019s \u201cThe Passion of the Christ\u201d fell not to Christian filmmakers but to two Christian P.R. firms that help Hollywood navigate church basements to market their movies to the faithful. For its recent release &#8220;The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/does-jesus-need-pr.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Idol Chatter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2006-03-23T12:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"burb\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Does Jesus Need P.R.?","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/does-jesus-need-pr.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Does Jesus Need P.R.?","og_description":"Did somebody say \u201cPassion Effect\u201d? A recent CNN piece claims the greatest boon of Mel\u2019s \u201cThe Passion of the Christ\u201d fell not to Christian filmmakers but to two Christian P.R. firms that help Hollywood navigate church basements to market their movies to the faithful. 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