When Chick-fil-A announced in late November that it would stop donating to faith-based organizations, I was confused.
After all, just six months ago, I wrote an article applauding the faith-centric chicken chain for standing by its founder, Truett Cathy, and the values he built the business on.
I’ve been studying the role faith plays in marketing to the New Heartland for over a decade.
When I unveiled the New Heartland as an under served cultural segment at the Pepsico bottlers meeting in 2010, I was advised by a friend who was a senior marketer at P&G, to avoid talking about faith completely.
He said faith in marketing is «too polarizing.» For a minute, I took his advice, because I wanted people to like me.
After a little soul searching, and based on my research, faith, not religion, is a major core value New Heartlanders hold dear.
Luckily, the folks at the meeting understood where I was coming from and how faith factors into purchase behavior.
Get to a place where you understand the role faith plays.
Lately, entertainment and faith have been intersecting in ways that reflect a New Heartland state of mind.
Faith and its connection to pop culture is gaining ground with both New Heartland and non-New Heartland personalities leading the way.
Together, celebrities from different religious backgrounds are showing that it’s OK to embrace your faith.
It’s about faith…however you practice it.
Faith is finding its way into unexpected mediums across a variety of genres through believers with a platform.
Now in his 20’s, the pop star is regularly in the news for associations with faith.
2019 was the year of embracing faith in country music.
Some notable songs featuring faith include Matt Stell’s «Prayed For You,» Blake Shelton’s «God’s Country» and Little Big Town’s «The Daughters,» fans were introduced to «Monsters» by Eric Church at the end of the summer.
Since his first EP, «Sinners Like Me,» Church has danced with faith in his lyrics to much success.
He uses Jesus’ name on network TV, volunteers for Kids of the Kingdom in his hometown of Chicago, and shares his message of faith through his music.
One of his most faith-driven endeavors, Coloring Book, reached 1.
Swedish DJs Galantis and Dutch singer Mr. Probz approached Parton with a proposal to sing on their EDM remake of John Hiatt’s 80s hit, «Faith.» Many of her country songs have been re purposed as party mixes, but this is the first time she collaborated on a venture of this type outside of her bluegrass roots.
Her collaborations following 18 years away from the stage are predominantly faith-focused.
In addition to «Faith,» Parton joined forces with For King and Country earlier in 2019 on their song «God Only Knows».
The music video for «Faith» has attracted nearly 5.
Kumail Nanjiani Mixes Comedy and Faith
In the years after 9/11, however, he decided that tying his message to his Muslim faith would be a way he could increase understanding of the culture in America.
Many marketers eliminate considerations of the role of faith from advertising because they don’t want to seem out of touch, uncool, or weak.
When agency and brand decision ignore the role of faith in buying behavior, they greatly dilute the impact of their messaging.
Faith is a core value that shouldn’t be ignored.
The campaign is one of a handful of recent initiatives to challenge the taboo around organ donation among Sikh and other South Asian communities in the U.K.
But when most people speak to medical professionals and faith leaders openly about the process and understand that one donor can save nine lives, they typically decide against opting out, advocates said.
The change in the law has forced several faith communities to reckon with the question of organ donations’ religious permissibility.
Last year, Project 550 and British Sikh Nurses were among 25 faith-based and community initiatives funded by the National Health Services Blood and Transplant’s BAME Community Investment Scheme to educate black and minority ethnic communities about organ donation.
The British Sikh Report’s analysis of these numbers suggested that religiosity did not notably affect Sikhs’ organ donation registration rates, with these numbers remaining fairly steady regardless of the number of Sikh articles of faith a person wears or whether they have been baptized in a ritual ceremony.
«For the Sikh community, the concept of seva or selfless service is a fundamental principle of the faith,» Jasvir Singh, chairman of the report and of the City Sikhs charity organization, told Religion News Service.
«Our fundamental faith encourages us to spend all our life becoming detached from our body and detached from worldly possessions,» Gill said.
«It seems ironic that at the end, we would want to become even more attached to the body. But in our faith, once you’ve left your body, it’s just an empty vessel that’s going to decay in the ground or be cremated.»Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun, has now been granted asylum in Canada
The second was that she raised an issue that is affecting many families in the region around the way men and women are treated so differently, and the third was she said she had rejected her faith, in this case Islam.
One ex-Muslim told me that her family read out the Islamic description of Hell and repeatedly claimed that her soul was bound to go through the contorted stages of pain described in the faith.
The pressures of faith, family and the stifling environment around him meant that he had to disengage for his own mental health.
I know of Christians who have left their faith and converted to Islam who talk of pressures from their families, and where some have had their immediate family stop all communication, sometimes for decades.
Apart from the fact that her courage has shown many people that they can take charge of their life and their destinies, Rahaf has highlighted something that is still taboo to raise in the Middle East – that people can choose to leave faith behind and make active choices about what they do and do not believe in.
In all of this, it is important to mention that it is not faith or religions themselves that are the problem.
Thus, as a faith community it is important to be aware of how to assist others who suffer from depression, be aware of our own feelings, take care of ourselves and be able to maintain our faith and not feel less of or minimised because of an emotional struggle, Ms Wellman said.
I believe empowering our faith community on this topic is very important.
Ms Wellman, who has 15 years experience in the field, said the subject is taboo in every church denomination.
One of her goals in speaking with them was to break down the stigma that suffering from depression means you are not strong enough in your faith, or just need more prayer.
Suffering with depression doesnt mean that you are crazy, less of, or that you have little or no faith in God.
Thats why support at those moments from our faith community is very important.
As Christians we will have moments where our faith will be tested and because of this we might lose hope.
I believe that God has placed members in our churches/faith community with gifts and talents to assist those in our community with the face-to-face approach, so it is important to have a greater understanding of a biopsychosocial approach to life in our faith community, she said.
I want believers whom are struggling with a mental health issue to know that there are days that, no matter how great of a believer you are, you may lose hope and faith and may feel guilty that you are depressed and doubting your faith, she said.
The effects of these doctrines can have a drastic effect on youth growing up in Utah, and in particular, in the LDS faith — a faith which holds community and family to the highest standard — making it alarmingly easy for someone to feel like they don’t belong.
Reynolds has vowed to keep his festival going until it is no longer needed — until the people of Utah and the LDS faith understand.
Relocating to the U.S. from Mumbai, Anushka seeks the guidance of talented producer Duddy Brown and songwriter Danni Poppitt, as she takes a leap of faith, releasing her debut single, properly-titled, «Rebirth».
Discovering the energy to self-love and self-heal, Anushka sings of overcoming near self-destruction through faith.
Anushka Jag new single, «Rebirth» is available now via Taboo Records.
Though he has premarital sex –which can be considered taboo in Islam – he doesn’t drink or do drugs, and he also performs his daily prayers.
«I felt like a lot of stories I saw about first-generation kids, or about anyone who comes from a strong cultural or faith background, was them fighting their parents and telling their parents, ‘I don’t want to be this. … I want to be white. I want to be like everyone else,» he said.
Due to such diversity within the faith, he said it is hard to pin down a universal perspective.
Ultimately, however, he said he’d rather write these stories himself than see them handled by people outside of the faith.
Commentators have noted that an emphasis on mediation and the maintenance of relationships, even if they are abusive, is common within many religious and faith communities.
Faith and religion are well recognised as having a powerful influence on attitudes, beliefs and social norms related to family and domestic violence (FDV), but empirical academic research on the subject remains scarce.
We recently conducted a study with leaders and community members from various faiths to better understand the capacity of faith communities to address and prevent FDV.
Our initial findings indicate that while FDV is a common problem in faith communities, it remains poorly understood.
Family and domestic violence is a taboo topic
We also spoke with key people who had experience working in FDV with faith leaders and faith communities.
In our interviews, participants often described FDV as being a taboo topic.
It was also considered a private, family issue – we found it was rarely spoken about openly in faith and religious communities.
According to participants, faith communities’ understanding of FDV was generally limited to acts of physical violence.
Participants also said that conversations about FDV are sometimes met with denial and defensiveness among faith communities.
This was true across different faiths.
Many participants emphasised that faith and religion does not condone violence.
In particular, religious beliefs about hierarchical gender roles and male authority that consider men and women to be «equal but different» were seen by some participants as a strong influence on attitudes to FDV within faith communities.
Participants across many faiths saw a focus on keeping couples and marriages together as being of primary importance in their communities.
How faith leaders respond to the problem
Participants thought the capacity of faith leaders’ and faith communities’ to address and prevent FDV was limited and highly variable.
There are grassroots groups and informal leaders across faith communities doing important work in this area.
Some community members expressed that their faith gave them support in difficult times – including when experiencing FDV.
Several faith leaders observed that some other leaders didn’t share the same level of skills, awareness and responsibility in responding to FDV.
Some faith leaders were viewed as falsely confident and lacking insight into their own limitations – a problem perpetuated by their positions of power within their community.
These include: more information about what constitutes FDV and the harm FDV can have on individuals and their families to increase awareness and understanding of the issue more resources to support and train faith leaders, community leaders, and grassroots faith groups in FDV work more evidence of the prevalence of FDV in faith communities should be gathered to motivate and engage those that deny or minimise the existence of FDV in their community marriage preparation, and counselling and religious sermons should include information about respectful and healthy relationships and FDV organisations in the FDV sector need to work together in partnership with faith leaders and communities to achieve change in FDV work.
More broadly, to prevent and stop FDV and the harm it causes, we need greater reflection on the attitudes and beliefs that drive FDV across all sections of the community, including within faith communities.
The text of this article was generated by the Breaking The Silence system that collected 8 news articles posted on the web from January 2019 to September 2020 and clustered for the taboo subjects related to faith
