ADVERTISING, CONTROVERSY,
and the STATE of NATIONAL DEBATE
Acts 17:16-23

A sermon given by the Rev. Richard H. Taylor
January 16, 2005 / Second Sunday after Epiphany

In the 1960's during the height of the Civil Rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. asked the United Church of Christ to take a lead in opening American media to justice and inclusion.

At that time all across the nation there was hardly such a thing on television as a Black news reporter, or an African-American weather reporter or sports caster. No African-American had starred in a major television series. Indeed in many southern states Blacks were not only excluded from employment and media leadership, but were routinely discriminated against in the way the news was covered. In many areas the only Black faces appearing on the television were people charged with crimes, while the crimes of white people got little coverage. Conversely, happy events in the white community were featured, but similar events in the Black communities never were covered.

One particularly galling case was WLBT of Jackson, Mississippi, the most powerful television station in that state. While nearly half of Mississippi's population was African-American, the largest proportion of any state in the nation, their only appearance on Mississippi television was in a negative way. Following Dr. King's request, the United Church of Christ, our denomination, brought suit against the owners of WLBT. They charged that since the airwaves are owned by all the people and only licensed to a given station, the station was required to serve all of the people. At the same time a local group of African-American leaders, College educators at Tougaloo and other schools, and Civil Rights leaders from other races formed a coalition and corporation to claim the WLBT license. In a landmark decision the courts ruled that the airwaves were for all of the people, the owners lost the license and it was transferred to the new coalition. The Church said the media should be inclusive.

Events of the last year relate interestingly to this story.

Last spring Beneficent decided to sponsor some broadcasts on WRNI, the local Rhode Island AM public radio station. As is the case with public radio we were allowed to identify our sponsorship with a couple of sentences. We initially gave them a form of the statement you see in the bulletin every week: Beneficent Church is a wellspring of Christian faith for a diverse people in the heart of the City of Providence, and a voice for justice. WRNI approved and sent the copy up to Boston University, which, as you probably know, has had control of the local station. Well the people in Boston decided that we had to remove the phrase "a voice for justice" because it was too political. Now I find that astonishing. Justice is a religious idea. Its all over my Bible. You would think that Dr. King's alma mater would know that. But, on the other hand, other recent events from BU, including information that has come out about the way they ran the radio station, suggest that some people there may need to learn about justice.

Then there was the national controversy last month about the television advertisements produced by our own United Church of Christ. As a pastor I have often met people who felt they were rejected or not welcome in a church. Some have even told me about being specifically turned away. The ads sought to address that reality in a humorous and mythical way by showing men who looked light nightclub bouncers standing outside of a church and turning many people seeking to worship away. Well, both the national NBC and CBS networks refused to carry the advertisement because it was "too controversial." CBS even said they were rejecting the ad because the Executive Branch of the government had offered a Constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Many people wondered what in the world that had to do with the ad? On careful scrutiny it appeared that in a brief second of the ad, two men who were being turned away may have been holding hands.

Well, most of you know I and Beneficent Church are in favor of welcoming all people. But apparently we are not able to say that on television, even if we pay to buy the time!

There is a question here about how does the liberal church get its message out? If the people own the airwaves aren't we entitled to some of the time?

There is an aspect of this where we have to learn from our own mistakes. When radio and television were new media, some of the free time that broadcasters were supposed to donate to community service was supposed to be religious broadcasting. At that time, because of the dominance of mainline White Anglo-Saxon Protestants in the nation's power structure, most of the free religious time went to mainline Protestant churches like Beneficent. Most fundamentalist groups had to buy time for their shows. In the 1960's, in the name of equal justice, free time for religion was abolished. Since then we disappeared from the airwaves, while the fundamentalists continued to buy their shows. Also since then our membership has declined, while the fundamentalists have grown. We need a way to get our message out. Beneficent's supporting public radio and the UCC ads were part of a plan to do that.

But now we are told we can't even buy time. Justice, we are told is a political issue. A grand and glorious welcome is too controversial! It is too adversarial.

But don't the media people realize that all advertising is adversarial? Advertising is designed to try to get you to do something you were not planning on doing. Aren't the advertisements that promote rampant materialism controversial? Shouldn't the claims to buy, buy, buy, and eat, eat, eat, and you're nothing unless you have this or that be considered controversial? Shouldn't the use of gratuitous sex to sell everything be controversial? Shouldn't hard-liquor ads on the roofs of NASCAR vehicles vying for the hero worship of ten-year olds be considered controversial?

And if the advertisements themselves are not controversial, what about the violence ridden shows themselves?

The problem is, of course, that the media are owned by the promoters of materialism. Those set out to saddle American families with debt will not find materialism controversial. They will find moral principals of justice and inclusion and simple living controversial. Control of the people's airwaves has been turned over to a small group of powerful corporations. So I am deeply concerned about how a national debate about really significant issues can take place in such a climate.

But I am also concerned about how the mainline church can get out its message. When Paul went to Athens there was a free and open market place for ideas where he could go to express himself, and announce the radical actions of God. Paul had both the market place and the Areopagus in which to state his message and give his testimony.

Now I also have been called to get the message out. But unlike Paul I cannot go into the agora - the market place - where everyone is and speak, as I could have in ancient Athens. I cannot go there because there is no such large free market place to express my ideas as there was then. I cannot go to the Mall - it is private property. I cannot go to Wal-Mart or Target. Even the Salvation Army can't get in there with their bell-ringers. Now I cannot even go on the television - even when I am one of the people who own the airwaves - because the government has sold them to someone else - General Electric.

So I am less free than the peasants of Athens and Rome. So what shall I do? Shall I go into the streets and compel them to come in?

Dr. King was right. It is important that all sides get access to the media. Dr. King was right, the message of justice needs to get out. We need to speak it, as he spoke it, from the pulpits of churches. But we need also to speak it from the television and the radio. And if they will not allow us to speak it there, then we need to speak it on bridges in Selma, from jails in Birmingham, and from the steps of malls in Washington!

The church must again be energized to preach in public its message of justice and welcome.

But we must also change the national debate. We must wrest the media from the grip of materialism, lust, and violence, and turn it into an open forum of liberty and justice for all. We must be bold like Paul to speak the message of God.

Amen.