Religion News Service is a terrific source of, and clearinghouse for, exactly what it sounds like — solid reporting on religion news. It’s home to some great, prolific journalists who understand and navigate the religious angles of American life, whether in organized religion or in all the less-organized ways that religion has an impact on our lives, culture, and politics. RNS is great.
As a news wire service, RNS also distributes raw press releases and I also get these in my RSS feed. These are often great too, but in a different way. Some are endearingly clumsy, others are so slickly professional they’re repulsive.
One way to describe the difference between a news report and a press release is that a news report has to get approved by editors while a press release just has to get approved by management. That’s why press releases have developed their own unique language that reads like this:
FrontGate has expanded its capabilities to meet the evolving needs of advertisers and organizations operating in the values-based space. Its integrated service offerings include brand strategy, public relations, media buying, influencer marketing, event sponsorships, fundraising campaigns, and Emmy® Award-winning video production through its FrontGate Moving Pictures division.
Those are words. They are mostly recognizable English words that I, as an English-speaker, mostly understand. And if I wrestle with that paragraph long enough, I can eventually discern the intended meaning of those words which seems to be, ironically, that the people writing them are available for hire as communications specialists.
For some reason, I’ve started collecting items from this press release slush pile. Here’s a few I’ve collected recently.
• This one just gets worse the longer it goes: “Infinity Concepts acquires InChrist Communications, expands strategic public relations platform.”
Infinity Concepts, a nationally recognized leader in faith-based brand strategy and integrated communications, today announced the acquisition of InChrist Communications, a respected public relations agency known for its strategic counsel, crisis communications expertise, and long-standing client relationships.
The acquisition strengthens the public relations platform of Infinity Concepts and advances the long-term growth strategy of its parent company, Infinity Concepts Group (ICG), to deliver fully integrated brand, communications, and growth solutions for ministries, nonprofits, and purpose-driven organizations nationwide.
Again, those corporate jargon MadLibs paragraphs were written by people who claim to be “communications” professionals. Translate that into English — to the extent that’s even possible — and you’ll see that the headline here is that a PR firm has acquired a smaller “crisis communications” outfit that was named “InChrist Communications.”
“Crisis communications” is a euphemism for fixers, scandal-erasers, image-protectors — the hired guns your bring in when you’ve gotten caught with your hand in the cookie jar or caught in flagrante with a live boy or a dead girl. Having “InChrist” as the name for that firm sounds like an over-the-top bit from The Righteous Gemstones.
A fixer-in-Christ would seem like someone you hire when you’ve decided to do anything other than confess, repent, restore and seek to atone for your sins. (Having said that, I would absolutely watch a TV series called “Fixer in Christ.”)
• “Gloo named Diamond Sponsor of NRB 2026 International Christian Media Convention”
I do not trust “Gloo.” This is one more reason why. The NRB is a far-right, utterly bonkers collection of televangelists and the people they’ve made millionaires — a trade group that makes the NFL owners seem pious, rational, and morally upstanding by comparison.
And what is “Gloo”? It’s an “AI-Powered technology platform for the faith and flourishing ecosystem.” It presents itself as something like a Cambridge Analytic for churches, and seems intent on doing for churches what Cambridge Analytic has done for America and the UK. It seems to collect and analyze “data.” My guess it that it collects and sells data. To whom? For what? I have no doubt that someone is “flourishing” due to all this data collection, but I don’t think it’s going to be churches or the people they are meant to serve.
• “Growth in Flourishing Workplaces for Kingdom Impact: 2025 Certified Best Christian Workplaces.”
How did “flourishing” become the hot new Christian corporate buzzword? Is everybody suddenly reading Miroslav Wolf? Somehow I suspect not — I trust the word when he uses it, but not the way they’re using it.
In the headline above, flourishing is just one of many English words, all of which I recognize and know, but none of that helps me to understand what’s being communicated by the communications professionals here. I think one corporate group is touting the fact that they’ve been granted an award by another corporate group, which is impressive in precisely the way that listing a “Who’s Who” entry on your resume is impressive. Or a blue check on Twitter.
I mean, I like the idea of good workplaces. I think they’re probably better than bad workplaces which are, in my opinion, not good. Or, at least, less good. But I always suspect that these certifications for good workplaces ultimately define a “good workplace” as one that hired the consulting firm that, not-so-coincidentally, is also the one doing the certifying.
Southern Baptist publishing houses are putting out spiral-bound notebook Bibles. That’s good. It makes the Southern Baptist tradition of ripping pages out of their Bibles much more festive. Confetti! Wheeee!
From the press release: “She Reads Truth invites women of all ages to engage Scripture through daily reading plans, online conversation led by a vibrant community of contributors, and offline resources created at the intersection of beauty, goodness and truth.”
(That reminds me to pre-order Kristin Kobes Du Mez’s next book.)
• A four-part audio drama on the life of Christ is something that makes sense for Holy Week, and the voice talent lined up for this one is impressive. But this sentence of press-release language still made me laugh: “Listeners can enjoy THE CHRIST for free wherever they get their podcasts.”
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In