For the third consecutive year, an advertisement about Jesus Christ will air during the Super Bowl.
The ‘He Gets Us’ campaign will run a 60-second ad during the first half of Sunday’s game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles, bringing a dose of religion to an otherwise corporate-centered lineup of commercials. A spokesperson for the group wrote in an email that the ad will explore ‘how Jesus redefined true greatness and what it might mean for us.’
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With a 30-second slot during this year’s FOX television broadcast reportedly running between $7 million and $8 million, the ad is sure to renew familiar questions about the group, as well as the entity and people behind it.
What is ‘He Gets Us’?
The campaign started in 2022 as a reported $100 million attempt to shift the conversation about Jesus Christ and Christianity. It describes itself on its web site as a non-denominational campaign, with no ties to a specific church.
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‘Our point is that the story of Jesus doesn’t belong to anyone,’ the web site states.
‘He Gets Us’ has run advertisements on a variety of platforms over the past three years but become best known for the 30-second and 60-second ads it aired during each of the past two Super Bowl broadcasts.
This year, the group will run one 60-second spot. It also hosted a music festival in New Orleans on Saturday starring Grammy Award winning musician Jon Batiste, who is slated to sing the national anthem before Sunday’s game.
Who is behind the ‘He Gets Us’ commercials?
The ‘He Gets Us’ campaign was previously a subsidiary of the Signatry, a Kansas-based non-profit organization also known as the Servant Foundation. It now operates under the umbrella of a non-profit organization called ‘Come Near,’ which acquired it last year.
A spokesperson for Come Near said the non-profit organization has grown from five to 15 full-time employees over the past 12 months. Ken Calwell, a former executive at Wendy’s and Papa Murphy’s, is its chief executive officer, while the non-profit’s web site lists a six-person board of directors.
The commercials themselves are produced by LERMA/, a Dallas-based advertising agency.
Who funds ‘He Gets Us’?
This remains a bit of a mystery.
The Come Near spokesperson told USA TODAY Sports in an email only that the group’s funds come from ‘a growing group of individuals and entities who share a common goal to raise the public conversation about Jesus’
‘Come Near, like many nonprofits, does not disclose details on individuals or groups that contribute financially in support of its mission,’ the spokesperson wrote.
Come Near is also exempted from filing a public tax document with the Internal Revenue Service, the spokesperson added, because of it claims to be a church, association of churches or auxiliary of a church.
Non-profit organizations are usually required by law to file an annual financial document known as a Form 990, which is made available to the public, as a condition of their non-profit status. The form details an organization’s expenses and revenues for the year, as well as its highest-paid employees and, in some cases, top donors. Come Near’s exemption means that there will be no publicly-available information about its finances like there was for its predecessor, the Signatry.
The most prominent known donor to the campaign is Hobby Lobby founder David Green, who confirmed his involved with ‘He Gets Us’ to right-wing talk show host Glenn Beck in 2022. But it is unclear how many other donors, and whom, are bankrolling the Super Bowl ad campaign.
Why does ‘He Gets Us’ advertise during the Super Bowl?
Given the exhorbitant costs of Super Bowl advertising, the decision by ‘He Gets Us’ to run commercials during the game − rather than donating the money to community programs or charities − has repeatedly drawn criticism.
‘Something tells me Jesus would *not* spend millions of dollars on Super Bowl ads to make fascism look benign,’ U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., wrote on Twitter after the first Super Bowl commercials ran in 2023.
The Come Near spokesperson said the campaign advertises during the Super Bowl because it is a major cultural moment and the group has ‘conviction that raising public conversation about Jesus has merit in culture today.’ The spokesperson said the ads have helped increase awareness of the campaign, which has generated 8.5 billion video views and 2 million web site page views to date.
Contact Tom Schad at tschad@usatoday.com or on social media @tomschad.bsky.social.
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