Preaching to Convert: Evangelical Outreach and Performance Activism in a Secular Age

7: Staging Church, Marketing the Divine

220 Chapter 7 Staging Church, Marketing the Divine ••• The video begins with a young couple pulling into a Starbucks. “So, are you nervous?” the young woman asks. “Because I haven’t been to a coffee shop since I was a little girl.” The storefront looms in the windshield. “At least you’ve been to a coffee shop,” her husband replies. Searching for a free space in the immense, comically crowded lot, they whisper to each other about the bumper stickers they see. One reads, “Real Men [heart] Java.” Another challenges, “Think this coffee’s hot?” accompanied with a mug spouting hellfire flames. A third decal displays a Starbucks insignia Pac-Man-chomping the Columbia Coffee label. The pair finally finds an empty space (“So far away!” notes the woman ). As they cross the lot to the entrance, they snicker at reserved parking signs at choice spots near the door for “Barista,” “Manager,” and “Manager’s Wife.” On the building itself, a sign in clichéd Papyrus font proclaims, “International Anointed First Starbucks of the Northern Valley .” They have to try several doors before finding one that opens. Entering , they pass young men sporting “greeter” badges but ignoring the visitors to chat among themselves. Once inside, the couple finds the restaurant replete with slapdash, mismatched posters touting the benefits of coffee drinking, the gospel of caffeine. The posters’ messages lurch haphazardly from touchy-feely (“Let the Aroma of Coffee Fill This Place”) to threatening (“Coffee shall Staging Church • 221 be hot or cold. If lukewarm, I will spew out of my mouth”) to evangelistic (“How to share Starbucks with your friends: Start a conversation. Bring up coffee and ask them to go to Starbucks with you”). Well-dressed people in line or lounging in chairs eye the couple dismissively and return to their own conversations. A man’s voice booms over the speakers , shilling for the restaurant’s current drive to make 500 new coffee converts. “Because remember,” he concludes, “coffee is good . . .” “All the time!” everyone in the restaurant answers automatically. “And all the time . . .” the announcer responds. “Coffee is good!” complete the patron-parishioners. The visiting couple stands, bemused, not sure what to say or where to go. A barista finally greets them and asks what they’d like. “I think I just want some coffee,” says the man. The barista smiles condescendingly. “You’ve never been here before, have you?” He grabs a microphone and speaks into it. “Excuse me—if this is your first time visiting with us, would you go ahead and raise your hands? We would love to welcome you.” Mortified , the couple awkwardly obeys. The other patrons clap or tip their mugs in toast. “Java-luyah!” they intone. The barista hands the couple lengthy forms to fill out (“We would love to get some information about you”), promising them a “special gift” once they’ve completed it. They couple protests that they just want some coffee, but the barista insists: form first. Needless to say, by the time the couple completes the form and gets their cup (having endured a coffee testimonial-cum-fundraising spiel), they’ve decided not to return.1 Evangelicals (and former evangelicals) of a certain cast will recognize many of the ham-fisted techniques and embarrassing failures the fictional “International Anointed First Starbucks” practices: the cheesymanipulative tone, rituals that exclude the uninitiated (e.g., The barista ’s call-and-response is a play on the evangelical “God is good / All the time / All the time / God is good”), the cliquishness of members, and an overall focus on misplaced priorities. The parody video suggests that churches can be as manipulative and false as the stereotype of a fastfood chain like Starbucks. Yet the video’s creator, Richard Reising, is not launching broadside against Christianity for being too much like Starbucks. On the contrary, Reising’s company Artistry Labs (formerly Artistry Marketing) designed the video, titled “What if Starbucks Marketed like the Church? A Parable,” to assert that Christian churches are not enough like Starbucks. The problem Reising spotlights is not that churches market themselves but that so many churches market themselves badly, flubbing the tasks of product branding, consumer research, 222 • preaching to convert employee ethos, and customer care that (in his view) Starbucks executes so well. Like any Starbucks, Reising argues, churches should invest time and interest in seeing themselves through strangers’ eyes. Good intentions are insufficient. Effective...