Only Certain Types of Christian Ads Welcome in Super Bowl

The general reaction to Focus on the Family's Super Bowl ad, starring college quarterback Tim Tebow, seems to be, "What was all the fuss about?" The ad (video below) featured Tebow for only a few seconds and contained no overt message about abortion (although you'll find plenty of those on FOF's web site, which the ad promoted).

USA Today religion columnist Cathy Lynn Grossman said it best:

... it's a major score in the "Euphemism Bowl" -- no mention of abortion, of choosing to carry a life-threatening pregnancy to term or anything else politically hairy.

And she points out (yet another) controversy regarding CBS's inconsistent decision-making in allowing the Christian group's ad to air: CBS rejected the United Church of Christ's ad -- which said that gay men and women were welcome at its services -- in 2004 and 2005. That ad showed a set of bouncers staffing a velvet rope in front of a neighborhood church, saying "no way, not you!" to congregants they didn't like the look of. "Jesus didn't turn people away," was the tagline (video below).

The church's Rev. J. Bennett Guess said:

I found the ad typical of Focus on the Family's longstanding approach --utilize attractive, popular and poised spokespersons to enlist surface support from unsuspecting people for a zealous political organization that serves and supports only the narrowest view of the word 'family.'

Through its diligent work to criminalize reproductive choice and birth control, deny civil rights protections for gays and lesbians, scapegoat immigrants, and reduce support for our nation's public schools, Focus on the Family's ad doesn't begin to tell their full story.

You can see the two ads below:

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