The United Methodist Church’s Nashville-based communications arm is spending millions on a new round of TV advertising in an effort to battle religious stereotypes and appeal to younger members.
Methodists are the only mainline protestants with this kind of dedicated communications function. Its leaders downplay the expense — Their entire annual budget is still “less than the average cost to run a single Super Bowl commercial,” says Sherri Thiel, interim chief executive of United Methodist Communications.
“We have made a financial commitment to support awareness of The United Methodist Church and its outreach around the world.”
UMC typically spends several million dollars a year on ads. But the
current campaign is the most costly since the church took to the airwaves more than a decade ago, according to a denomination spokesperson.
“We think church is more than a place to go on Sunday. We think church can happen anywhere,” a voiceover on one of the ads says over images of church members teaching in schools, working in prisons and even rallying on the steps of a government building.
UMC’s Jennifer Rodia says the campaign speaks to a “paradigm shift about the concept of church,” one that Methodists hope will be attractive to millenials, who are
increasingly steering away from mainline denominations.
On Air - 90.3 WPLN-FM