Churches are now looking for pastors with 'marketing skills'
-
[quote]Originally posted by Gedanken:
[b]
Uh, I don't see anything in the article that implies that any of the three churches was trying to get Schlotfelt's services by offering a fat paycheck. Second, as far as I can tell, Schlotfelt was already a reverend, rather than being tempted into the role by the promise of money.
The article didn't imply that they were offering him a fat paycheck; but it obviously implied that they were more interested in his 'marketing skills' than (and this is the point) other skills that are more traditionally associated with the vocation of a pastor.
I'm the one who inferred that the paychecks Protestant pastors typically get (and are offered) are 'fat' in comparison to the benefits that are to be expected by those who are recruited into the Catholic priesthood.
I hope this clarifies my position.
You shouldn't hire a pastor primarily for his marketing skills.
That is a mistake.
Ben -
I'll admit that it all seems a bit crass, but let's look at the reality of the situation. Speaking broadly, Catholicism (I'm one, by the way) is more likely to be passed down from one generation to another, but denominations that recruit more actively are effectively more diligent in their charter to go forth and spread the Word, are they not? Let's face it - Jesus Christ these days is in direct competition with Ronald McDonald, Levi Strauss and the latest doe-eyed stars from Hollywood. Something's got to be done, and I honestly cannot remember the last time I saw a Catholic evangelising.
Ultimately, if the marketing is an exercise in getting more people into the Churches, and not anything else, I fail to see what the problem is. As I mentioned earlier, fellows like Schlotfelt are pastors already, which makes the commitment to spreading the Word their primary characteristic - their marketing skills are a bonus. -
REally, I dun see any churches in today using miracles to publicise whatsoever. Instead, we do see newspapers report miracles by some pagan religion (which I shall not mention names since some non Christians here can be more intolerant than some Christians).Originally posted by Gedanken:Uh, I don't see anything in the article that implies that any of the three churches was trying to get Schlotfelt's services by offering a fat paycheck. Second, as far as I can tell, Schlotfelt was already a reverend, rather than being tempted into the role by the promise of money.
Of course, we've got the Bakkers and Swaggarts out there, but even before I got a quarter way thrrough the article, the "go therefore and make disciples" bit popped into my head.
The fact is that evangelism is marketing applied to religious purposes, and the idea is the same although the scale has gone well out of the Galilee area. I'm not trying to be blasphemous here, but let's face it - raising the dead, turning water into wine and feeding a stadium-sized crowd with five loaves and two fishes was bound to generate some publicity.
Hey, things really took off for the Church when Gutenberg invented the printing press - it's just come full circle now and communications tools are coming back to the Church. -
Well, I would expect that some Pharisees and Saducees would have been heard expressing a similar sentiment about a certain Nazarene just over 2000 years ago, eh?Originally posted by Honeybunz:REally, I dun see any churches in today using miracles to publicise whatsoever. Instead, we do see newspapers report miracles by some pagan religion (which I shall not mention names since some non Christians here can be more intolerant than some Christians).
The miracles in themselves are incidental within this context. The point is that the charter of the Church, regardless of denomination, is to go out and bring the Good Word to the unaware. If it takes miracles or marketing to bring people about so that they can receive the message, so be it. -
I see a disturbing aspect of this thread, that Protestants and other unnamed religions are being put in a negative light.
Isn't it the teaching of Christ that his followers should be above being so judgemental?
-
The problem isn't with Schlotfelt (as I see it) but with the parties who were trying to hire him (or rather with the specific hiring policy adopted by these parties); I don't deny that this person may be everything he has claimed himself to be, that he has all of the primary characteristics that one would expect should be exhibited by a pastor, and that his 'marketing skills' are, as you have put it, 'a bonus'.
However, given the nature of the aforesaid hiring policy, it would be difficult to see how a rigorous application of it should be geared towards the hiring of pastors for whom 'marketing skills are a mere bonus', rather than their forte (that is, to the exclusion of other more primary skills).
The marketing of Christ (if it is to be conducted along the same lines as those of a secular advertising campaign) can certainly be expected to succeed in 'getting people into the Churches'; but my point is that the people who enter 'the Churches' because they are persuaded to do so by such a campaign, are probably going to be less convertible (so to speak) than they would otherwise be; and insofar as they are rendered 'less convertible' in this way, would their entrance into the Churches not be of any benefit to them; on the contrary, such persons would be prime candidates for being the sort of people who are likely to believe themselves regenerate, when they really are not.
Ben -
I get the sense that you're not making a distinction between marketing and selling, MrBach. One way of distinguishing marketing from selling is that with selling, you're trying to get someone to buy something, while the idea of marketing is to get someone to buy into an idea.
Even so, selling in some way, shape or form, is an integral part of marketing. I'm not saing that getting people into the Churches is the end in itself - it's simply a means to an end.
Okay, let's examine a secular model. Supposing that M1 has just launched a new mobile phone plan that cuts your bill by 50%. Once you've started using the plan, you find that it's the best thing that's ever happened to telephony, and you never look back.
What if M1 never advertised, though? Would you have known about the plan, or would you have continued to pay twice as much as necessary through ignorance?
It comes down to this one simple point - before you get someone to buy in to your idea, you'll need to get their attention first.
Let's face it, in this day and age we're bombarded with information at an unprecedented level. Can you imagine Christ today saying to Simon and Andrew, "Follow me and I will make you the fishers of men"? They'd probably ask him to wait for the ad break.
The reality of the situation is such that if you do want to get someone's attention these days, you absolutely cannot afford to take a quiet approach because there are so many competing influences screaming at the top of their lungs.
Vis-a-vis your point about people being convertible, that's not any different from how it's always been. After all, did everybody turn up to see and hear Jesus Christ for the express purpose of converting? No - the vast majority of them turned up out of curiosity after hearing about miracles he had performed.
The miracles themselves were incidental, were they not? Christ was spreading the word to repent and be saved, and strictly speaking, the miracles did not per se have anything to do with that message, did they? Instead, they got people's attention so that Jesus could deliver the rest of the message. Same thing applies here - the marketing's just to get people's attention so that the priests and ministers can deliver the Word.
Ultimately, not everybody who heard Christ himself was converted, and not everybody who steps into a church will be. Effectively, it's a numbers game, and the more people you deliver the word to, the more you'll save, and if it takes marketing to get people into a position to hear the Word, so be it. -
I don't deny that a message would need to be commended to someone in order for it to be possible for him to accept it (where he is unware of it beforehand); but the mode in which it is conveyed to him is a factor that is liable to distort its import, so that his acceptance of such a message when it has been conveyed to him by such a manner of means, might yet not entail that he will have accepted it in the way in which it was supposed to have been accepted.
That is why I am not against 'marketing' the Gospel in principle; but my reservation would be drawn insofar as the attempt should be made to 'market' the Gospel in certain modes.
That is also why I am not guilty of having failed to make the distinction you identify; for I am perfectly well aware that makerting is an activity that need be concerned only with the commendation of ideas.
My point rather is that the mode of marketing a given idea could have an effect on the way in which that idea is received (and specifically on whether or not the said idea is received correctly).
As regards your point about Christ's miracles, let me say that I do concede that not everyone turned up to see and hear Christ for the purpose of converting to the message that he had been concerned to preach to them; but I nevertheless also feel that the working of miracles by Christ (as an inducement to them to give their ears to His message) was not the sort of thing that in itself would have been liable to distort the message that Christ had come to preach to them; and that is precisely why those who had ultimately rejected Christ's message (and Christ's claims about Himself) in favour of seeking the miracles which they had rightly taken Christ to be capable of performing, were ultimately deemed blameworthy by Christ Himself.
While it is therefore a matter of concern to us that we should get as many people as possible into a position where it would be possible for us 'to deliver the word to them' (as you have put it); it still ought to be a matter of equal concern to us that we should not do this at the expense of presenting the word to them in a mode that is liable to distort its import.
If, for instance, we were (effectively) to tell persons to enter our Church because the girls therein are scantily attired; we would be 'marketing' the Gospel in a way that is almost certain to distort its import (apart from of course committing a grave sin in this regard); and such a procedure could never and should never be tolerated.
That is in essence the point I was trying to make.
Ben -
dun you get it??Originally posted by Gedanken:I get the sense that you're not making a distinction between marketing and selling, MrBach. One way of distinguishing marketing from selling is that with selling, you're trying to get someone to buy something, while the idea of marketing is to get someone to buy into an idea.
these days, you dun need to actualli SELL something in order to be considered as ''selling"!
duhz!!!
-
I sell my "idea" and I get 10% of their income
-
Well, it appears that we've actually reached the same point having taken different paths.Originally posted by MrBach:I don't deny that a message would need to be commended to someone in order for it to be possible for him to accept it (where he is unware of it beforehand); but the mode in which it is conveyed to him is a factor that is liable to distort its import, so that his acceptance of such a message when it has been conveyed to him by such a manner of means, might yet not entail that he will have accepted it in the way in which it was supposed to have been accepted.
That is why I am not against 'marketing' the Gospel in principle; but my reservation would be drawn insofar as the attempt should be made to 'market' the Gospel in certain modes.
That is also why I am not guilty of having failed to make the distinction you identify; for I am perfectly well aware that makerting is an activity that need be concerned only with the commendation of ideas.
My point rather is that the mode of marketing a given idea could have an effect on the way in which that idea is received (and specifically on whether or not the said idea is received correctly).
As regards your point about Christ's miracles, let me say that I do concede that not everyone turned up to see and hear Christ for the purpose of converting to the message that he had been concerned to preach to them; but I nevertheless also feel that the working of miracles by Christ (as an inducement to them to give their ears to His message) was not the sort of thing that in itself would have been liable to distort the message that Christ had come to preach to them; and that is precisely why those who had ultimately rejected Christ's message (and Christ's claims about Himself) in favour of seeking the miracles which they had rightly taken Christ to be capable of performing, were ultimately deemed blameworthy by Christ Himself.
While it is therefore a matter of concern to us that we should get as many people as possible into a position where it would be possible for us 'to deliver the word to them' (as you have put it); it still ought to be a matter of equal concern to us that we should not do this at the expense of presenting the word to them in a mode that is liable to distort its import.
If, for instance, we were (effectively) to tell persons to enter our Church because the girls therein are scantily attired; we would be 'marketing' the Gospel in a way that is almost certain to distort its import (apart from of course committing a grave sin in this regard); and such a procedure could never and should never be tolerated.
That is in essence the point I was trying to make.
Ben
Certainly false advertising cannot be condoned, be it to bring people to the church or for commercial purposes, and that bringing someone to church under false pretences does no one any favours.
The track that I'm going down is that in light of modern society's influences, religion is losing ground because it looks stodgy. Recognising that reality and taking active measures to overcome that negative image through marketing (but not misrepresenting the intent and purpose of the church) would be a matter of common sense. -
Yes, and I'm sure that's why your "channel my dead grandaunt and tell your fortune" business is doing a roaring trade.Originally posted by Mr Fugue:dun you get it??
these days, you dun need to actualli SELL something in order to be considered as ''selling"!
duhz!!!
Now run along and play. We're busy having a good discussion here.