Looking for a Body Shop, Finding Jesus : Advertising: A fish symbol or Scripture is a signal to consumers that a businessman is ‘born-again.’ It can attract some customers, offend others.
Buried among 18 pages of carpet-cleaner advertisements in the South Orange County Yellow Pages is one that sticks out from the rest.
“Born Again Carpet Care--Carpet Cleaners who care,” the ad proclaims.
“It connotes being a Christian company,” says Wendy Ellis, a “born-again” Christian and co-owner of the San Juan Capistrano family business. “But you can take it two ways: Your carpet can be born again after being cleaned.”
The Ellises are among a number of evangelical Christian business people in Southern California who are proclaiming their religious bent in order to tap into a little-known but prosperous market: Christian consumers. In so doing, religious scholars say, the advertisers appeal to fellow Christians to choose their services over a competitor who employs a conventional marketing approach.
Some “born-again” Christians allude to their religious beliefs in their company name. Others include passages from the Scriptures in their business advertisements. Still others place notices in various all-Christian business directories. But the most common method is the use of the fish--a widely recognized Christian symbol.
Most Christians say their intent is to glorify God rather than drum up business. But some people criticize the use of religious ads as a marketing ploy that has little to do with spiritual conviction.
“What difference does it make if one has ‘born-again’ shampoo? Does it wash away sin any more?” said Joseph Price, chairman of the religion department at Whittier College. “It seems to me the selling of Christianity (is) an attempt to enlarge one’s sales rather than to espouse values such as concern for the welfare of others.”
The ads have certain drawbacks, experts warn. They can offend some consumers, particularly people from different spiritual backgrounds or those who don’t believe in a deity at all. However, in areas where there is a flourishing evangelical community, the advantages often outweigh the risks.
For one thing, recent surveys suggest that Americans are placing more faith in religion as a means of solving their problems than ever before. Furthermore, nearly 90% of Americans, or 214 million people, identify themselves as Christians. Out of these, the number of evangelicals has swelled to more than 40 million during the past decade--meaning that the evangelical Christians now command considerable economic clout by sheer virtue of their numbers.
Still, Christian businessmen play down the market potential of religious advertising, preferring to emphasize its evangelical mission. They believe that publicizing their spiritual beliefs to potential customers provides yet another avenue for spreading the Lord’s word.
“My husband has been able to pray with people who are having physical and emotional problems,” said Ellis of Born Again Carpet Care. “If we didn’t advertise with that name, it would probably never get brought up.”
Shirley Langer, a “born-again” Christian who owns an air-conditioning sales company in Ventura, agrees. She and her husband ran a fish symbol in their Yellow Pages ad.
“It was just something that we wanted to do because we try to make God a partner in the business,” Langer said. “We get calls from people who saw the symbol and they say that’s what made them call. Others don’t mention it, but when you get to their homes there are other indications that they are Christians.”
Some scholars take a less charitable, and more cynical, view of the advertisements, which they say are marketing gimmicks designed to instill a sense of confidence in a potential customer.
“There have definitely been people who use this to get more business and maybe more gullible business,” said the Rev. Petra Verwijs, pastor of adult education at Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove. “People tell me they’ve had bad experiences. They had a sense of trust because they saw the (fish) symbol, but business was not done in any more ethical manner than any other places.”
The use of the fish as a symbol for Jesus dates back to about the 1st Century, a time when Christians were persecuted for their religious beliefs. Ichtus, the Greek word for fish, is an acronym in Greek for “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.” Since Christians could not speak openly about Jesus, they drew the sign of the fish to secretly alert fellow Christians to their identity.
“This was used in a time of persecution when people needed to know that there were others out there struggling and hanging in there. That’s different than marketing a product,” Verwijs said. “I on purpose don’t pick businesses that do that.”
Mike Yaconelli, editor of The Door, a tongue-in-cheek evangelical magazine based in San Diego, says the practice reflects badly on all Christians.
“What they’re doing is, they’re saying to other Christians, ‘You can trust us,’ ” said Yaconelli, whose magazine publishes some of the more unusual ads from newspapers around the country. “The reason people don’t take Christianity very seriously any more is because all people do is put it on their business cards and blab to get on television.”
A sampling of ads collected by the magazine staff included an advertisement for a “Christ-healing tuning piano” published in a Milwaukee religious newspaper; a tire shop in the Midwest selling “Jesus Saves Oil Changes,” and a “restaurant for the righteous” in Dallas that claimed to offer a “complete menu of pure food inspired by the Holy Spirit and Bible food.”
But devout Christians maintain these are merely examples of nonbelievers who will stop at nothing to make a buck.
“There are a lot of rip-off artists out there that do the same thing with Christian ads, so it makes it very difficult for someone who is Christian,” said Roberta Cole, who runs a roofing company in San Juan Capistrano with her husband. “I know of a man who claimed to be a Christian who ended up ripping off millions from the church.”
Cole says she and her husband chose a religious ad for their company because they believe the Lord directs their path. It reads: “Commit the Lord to whatever you do and your plans will succeed.”
“We want to be there to serve the whole community, but we also would like to give glory to the Lord for whatever we do that is good,” she said. “If it brings in business, great, but that wasn’t our intent.”
Christian Business Men’s committee spokesman Craig Kiggens says he has “philosophical” differences with advertisers who specifically target the Christian market.
“The biblical mandate is for Christians to be in the world,” said Kiggens, a field staff director for the national organization with 1,400 members in Southern California. “I see this as trying to be separate from the world.”
Religion is most often used as a marketing tool in the Bible Belt: generally the Deep South, Texas, Oklahoma and the lower Midwest. Orange County, home to several nationally known evangelical figures, also has a strong fundamentalist presence.
Scholars trace the practice to the rise of the “born-again” movement more than two decades ago under the leadership of popular evangelical preachers such as the Rev. Billy Graham. Gradually, the “born-again” phenomenon emerged from the fringes of American culture and into the mainstream, becoming a powerful religious force.
“The religious ads started with the Christian Yellow Pages--shop with us because we’re Christian, and you’ll get a better deal,” said Martin Marty, a professor of religion at the University of Chicago and a leading spokesman on contemporary Christian issues. “In general, it bred a lot of resentment among the non-”born again” because implicit was that if you’re not part of them, you’re not honest.”
Richard Fouquette, founder of the Christian Business and Professional Directory, which has five editions that circulate in Southern California, says that is not the intent of his publication. The free directory has a circulation of about 400,000 and is distributed through churches and other religious outlets.
“There are lots of directories available all over Southern California. Jewish people have directories of their own, the Asian community has a directory for their people,” Fouquette said. “It’s not just Christian business people.”
“We’re saying: ‘Here is someone you can depend on based on our track record,’ ” Fouquette added.
However, Fouquette said the directory routinely refuses ads from non-Christians. He said all advertisers are required to be financially “active” in a Christian church. Further, the directory staff verifies each advertiser’s religious affiliation before accepting the ad.
In 1984, the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith won a legal challenge against the now-defunct Orange County Christian Yellow Pages for a similar case. A state Court of Appeal ruled that the Christian-oriented business directory could not require advertisers to qualify as “born-again” Christians. The policy was challenged by two Jewish businessmen who wanted to advertise their Grecian art in the directory and were refused.
Los Angeles ADL director David A. Lehrer, who was the Jewish organization’s attorney for that case, says religious advertising is appropriate when religion “relates to the essence” of the business--the use of a fish symbol at a Christian bookstore for instance, or a Jewish Star of David at a kosher restaurant.
But in other cases, he says, this kind of advertising may be well-intended but ultimately is counterproductive.
“They are dissuading individuals who are not of a particular faith from using their services,” Lehrer said. “Many times, people do it quite innocently as an affirmation of their faith. But we try to tell them: ‘Your intentions may be quite noble, but if you’re wearing your religion on your sleeve, others will feel that they’re not welcome.’ ”
