An almighty brief
Now more than ever we should be looking to the heavens for help. The parlous situation in Iraq continues to threaten global stability, terrorism seemingly stalks every street and England’s chances of winning Euro 2004 look about as likely as the Sharons inviting the Arafats round for a chinwag and a cup of char.
Yet despite the mess we’ve got ourselves into, less and less people are putting their faith in a celestial being to help sort it out. If religion was once the opium of the people we seem to have gone cold turkey en mass.
Nowhere is this lack of faith more striking than in the UK. In a recent polll commissioned by the BBC, only 56 per cent of the population thought that God was more influential than David Beckham. We’re clearly dunbstruck.
The poll also found that the UK was by far the most secular nation of all those investigated (including the US, Russia and India, among others), we have the lowest attendance at religious ceremonies and, generally speaking, Britons thought the world would be a more peaceful place without Him. Well, seeing as it wouldn’t exist, they might have a point.
God is obviously not best pleased at this. However, rather than unleashing the four horsemen over the land to dispense their own unique brand of divine discipline, we’ve been led to believe He’s now considering launching a marketing campaign to win over this most sceptical of congregations.
Whether this is true or simply hearsay (or should that read heresy?) is difficult to ascertain. Nevertheless, in an effort to encourage debate of this emotive issue, while also reminding God of the excellent creative talent He saw fit to distribute outside the M25, Adline decided to charge several agencies with the task of promoting belief in Him. The brief was an open one, but, as ever, time was tight.
We’d like to take this opportunity to say thank you to those involved for some inspired and, in some cases, genuinely thought-provoking work. With creativity like this, one of them might just end up with the client from heaven ...