{"id":77,"date":"2006-01-06T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-01-06T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html"},"modified":"2006-01-06T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2006-01-06T12:00:00","slug":"adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html","title":{"rendered":"Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div>\n<p>Craig Gross and Mike Foster, a.k.a.  \u201cthe porn pastors\u201d and founders of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.xxxchurch.com\" target=\"_new\">XXXChurch.com<\/a>, are at the country\u2019s largest porn convention this weekend, the Adult Expo in Las Vegas. They&#8217;re there to remind customers, producers, and porn stars that Jesus loves them, too. Gross and Foster, former youth pastors, started their self-proclaimed \u201c#1 Christian porn website\u201d  in 2002 in an effort to tackle the issue of pornography from a different angle.<\/p>\n<p>These men (as well as their wives) are initiating dialogue about sex and pornography within the church  (in a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thencsp.com\/pornfacts.htm\" target=\"_new\">Christianity Today survey,  <\/a>33 percent  of pastors said they have been to a porn site) as well as with the porn industry itself using unconventional strategies.  One of those strategies has been for the porn pastors to rent exhibit booths at  major porn conventions in an effort to build relationships with people in the pornography industry so as to affect change from the inside out. Their one-of-a-kind ministry (be sure to go their website and read about their \u201cSave the kittens\u201d campaign) has also gotten the attention of everyone from Howard Stern to \u201cPlayboy\u201d magazine. Even harder to believe, a porn filmmaker actually helped the two men create a documentary about the ministry last year, called \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.missionarypositionsmovie.com\/\" target=\"_new\">Missionary Positions<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If you are curious or skeptical about the credibility of this ministry, XXX Church has a <a href=\"http:\/\/pure.typepad.com\/x3pure\/\" target=\"_new\">blog <\/a>on their website to journal Gross and Foster\u2019s encounters at this year&#8217;s Expo. And on a personal note,  I know many in the church community doubt their motives and question their methods, but I spent a day with them at a porn convention in Los Angeles (I was there strictly for journalistic purposes!) and was truly amazed at the impact they are having.<\/p>\n<div style=\"clear:both;padding-bottom:0.25em\"><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Craig Gross and Mike Foster, a.k.a. \u201cthe porn pastors\u201d and founders of XXXChurch.com, are at the country\u2019s largest porn convention this weekend, the Adult Expo in Las Vegas. They&#8217;re there to remind customers, producers, and porn stars that Jesus loves them, too. Gross and Foster, former youth pastors, started their self-proclaimed \u201c#1 Christian porn website\u201d&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":281,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77","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>Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX<\/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\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Craig Gross and Mike Foster, a.k.a. \u201cthe porn pastors\u201d and founders of XXXChurch.com, are at the country\u2019s largest porn convention this weekend, the Adult Expo in Las Vegas. They&#8217;re there to remind customers, producers, and porn stars that Jesus loves them, too. Gross and Foster, former youth pastors, started their self-proclaimed \u201c#1 Christian porn website\u201d&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Idol Chatter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2006-01-06T12:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"kris rasmussen\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX","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\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX","og_description":"Craig Gross and Mike Foster, a.k.a. \u201cthe porn pastors\u201d and founders of XXXChurch.com, are at the country\u2019s largest porn convention this weekend, the Adult Expo in Las Vegas. They&#8217;re there to remind customers, producers, and porn stars that Jesus loves them, too. Gross and Foster, former youth pastors, started their self-proclaimed \u201c#1 Christian porn website\u201d&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html","og_site_name":"Idol Chatter","article_published_time":"2006-01-06T12:00:00+00:00","author":"kris rasmussen","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html","name":"Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#website"},"datePublished":"2006-01-06T12:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2006-01-06T12:00:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/6baab619ead9f7802dafa6d473ab380e"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/01\/adult-expo-2006-where-the-gosp.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Adult Expo 2006: Where The Gospel Is Rated XXX"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/","name":"Idol Chatter","description":"Beliefnet Entertainment blog, TV blog, Movie blog, Religion in entertainment blog","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/6baab619ead9f7802dafa6d473ab380e","name":"kris rasmussen","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"kris rasmussen"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/author\/kris-rasmussen"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/281"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}