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Here’s why these 2013 super bowl commercials are so memorable
USA Today’s Ralphie Aversa looks back at the top three Ad Meter voted Super Bowl commercials from 2013.
Ad Meter, USA TODAY
Amid the snack treat, booze, car and gambling pitches, the service of extending a brand on Super Bowl Sunday nudged an unlikely figure into the spotlight of what’s often referred to as the USA’s biggest secular holiday.
Jesus Christ.
Sunday’s game gets two doses during a pair of advertisements for He Gets Us, a group touting itself as a “movement to reintroduce people to the Jesus of the Bible and his confounding love and forgiveness.”
He Gets Us will air two spots within a broadcast charging $7 million for 30 seconds.
AD METER: Everything to know for the big game’s commercials
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Not unlike well-known beer brands advertising on the big game, Christianity remains the dominant religious force in the USA, though leaders are concerned about brand diminishment in an increasingly stratified landscape. That’s in part what created the conditions for a pair of decidedly sobering ads that may kill a buzz or two throughout the land.
What is ‘He Gets Us’?
He Gets Us claims not to be “’left’ or ‘right’ or a political organization of any kind,” nor does it claim affiliation with a particular denomination. The group is a non-profit 501(c)(3) and a subsidiary of Servant Foundation.
What’s the Servant Foundation?
Servant Foundation is a Kansas-based non-profit that reported $405 million in total revenue for fiscal year 2020. From 2018-2020, Servant Foundation donated more than $50 million to the Alliance Defending Freedom, a non-profit known for fighting abortion rights and non-discrimination laws, according to Lever News.
The Southern Poverty Law Center listed the Alliance Defending Freedom as an anti-LGBTQ hate group in 2016, citing the ADF’s support of criminalizing homosexuality and approval of imprisoning LGBTQ individuals for engaging in consensual sex.
Who donates to ‘He Gets Us’?
While the group’s donors are largely anonymous, a significant figure publicly acknowledged his family was one of its biggest backers. Hobby Lobby founder and billionaire David Green informed talk show host Glenn Beck his family was helping fund the ads.
Green and Hobby Lobby won a significant victory in 2014 when the Supreme Court ruled that Hobby Lobby and other “closely held corporations” can continue to deny providing health insurance coverage for some or all forms of birth control based on religious objections. The ruling affected more than 60 million American workers at the time.
“You’re going to see it at the Super Bowl—‘He gets Us,’” Green told Beck. “We are wanting to say—we being a lot of people—that he gets us. He understands us. He loves who we hate. I think we have to let the public know and create a movement.”
Why does Jesus need a PR guy?
In short, like anyone else – to trump up interest in a brand some see diminishing.
“It fits with our target audience really well,” He Gets Us campaign spokesperson Jason Vanderground told The Associated Press. “We’re trying to get the message across to people who are spiritually open, but skeptical.”
In a September 2022 modeling, the Pew Research Center estimates that if Christians in the USA continue leaving religion at its current rate, Christians of all ages will shrink from the current 64% to “between a little more than half (54%) and just above one-third (35%) of all Americans by 2070.”
The study also estimates that if current trends continue, those identifying with no religion will increase from the current 30% to “somewhere between 34% and 52% of the U.S. population.”
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