Christmas starts with Christ

Christmas starts with Christ


Click to zoom

Published: 06 December 2011

The Church of England in Manchester is reminding Big Issue readers that Christmas starts with Christ this December.

Copies of the Big Issue, sold across the north of England in the run-up to Christmas, will carry full-page adverts featuring a modern twist on a traditional nativity scene, with the message ‘Christmas Starts with Christ’.

The adverts are part of a nationwide advertising campaign which includes churches buying a poster for their local bus stop and a series of radio ads aimed at young people. The Diocese of Manchester has teamed up with six other dioceses to place the Big Issue ads which will be seen by 52,000 people across the North West of England, Yorkshire and the Humber. Of these 31,200 are aged under 44, 16,000 of whom are between the ages of 15 and 34.

The picture used in the Big Issue adverts re-sets the nativity characters as modern professions dressed in high street fashions. Shepherds bare cycle couriers and plasterers. Wise men are successful entrepreneurs and their gifts are iconic "treasures" of modern culture. All are sharply dressed. But the traditional nativity arrangement is unchanged, with Jesus as its clear focus. And the message is compelling: "However you dress it up... Christmas Starts with Christ". It's the meeting of Christianity and high street consumerism, with Christ in the middle.

In the final few days before Christmas, millions of people will be loosing themselves in shopping. Could there be a better time to expose them to this Christian message?

Recent research by Theos reveals that only 12 per cent of adults know the Christmas story in any detail – and the figure drops to just 7 per cent among 18-24 year olds. To keep Christmas focused on Christ, churches need to constantly tell the story of his birth in ways that engage positively with the public.

Find out more at www.ChurchAds.net  


Other Stories