A Heinz view of outreach
‘Yesterday I preached a distinctly average sermon. It was delivered at a pace which many found hard to follow and at times it made the Bible look pallid, two-dimensional or just plain silly. Not to worry, though – the church was packed to overflowing, so that must be good‘. I think most people would find the argument above distinctly lacking in logic. If a piece of communication is poor, then the fact that lots of people bore witness to it is surely a bad, rather than a good, thing?
Over the past couple of weeks I have had a number of exchanges with friends and colleagues online about Channel 5′s ‘The Bible’. Some have found it to be dramatic, captivating and enthralling. Others have conceded that it might be not be quite that good, but that ’1.5 million people are watching it, so that has to be good.’ I am not at all convinced by that argument. It seems to owe more to the Heinz advertising campaign of 1961 which claimed that 1 million housewives choosing their beans meant that they must be a good thing, than it does to any clear argument. Of course if it ‘gets people talking’ than that must be good, they say. The thing is, are people talking about the Bible itself, or about ‘The Bible’? If it is the latter, in what sense does it help the church’s cause? To their great credit, the Bible Society have been entirely open in acknowledging both positive and negative critique of the series here.
The other thing is that we should not get too carried away by the numbers. Below I have taken a screenshot of the most recent figures available on BARB. (CLICK on image for full size) Whilst Channel 5 rarely attracts more than 2 million viewers for anything, the figures for viewing on older and more established channels are vastly bigger. I wonder how many of the The Bible’s 1.5 million viewers are Christians anyway?
Personally, I would rather have Tony Jordan’s ‘Nativity’ any day, and with an average audience of 4 million, perhaps there were those who were outside the church who shared my view?
Images: hatad.co.uk and barb.co.uk
