Skip to footer

ESPN rejects, then OKs Christmas charity ad

ESPN will now allow a television ad heralding the birth of Christ during a college basketball game Saturday. The ad asks viewers to write to sick children and "help us reveal God's healing presence this Christmas."

  • By Staff Associated Press

| St. Louis

ESPN has reversed course and will now allow a Catholic charity to air a television ad heralding the birth of Christ during a college basketball game this weekend, officials said.

The Cardinal Glennon Children's Foundation in St. Louis produced a 30-second spot asking viewers to write holiday messages to sick children. The ad seeks to "help us reveal God's healing presence this Christmas" and notes that the SSM Cardinal Glennon Children's Center "celebrate(s) the birth of Jesus and the season of giving."

The foundation helps support the teaching hospital financially.

The cable sports network initially rejected the ad last week, saying it didn't meet its advocacy standards, and it asked the charity for an alternative version, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Friday. However after coming under criticism by conservative pundits including Sarah Palin and Bill O'Reilly, who deemed the rejection part of a so-called secular war on Christmas, ESPN reversed its decision, said Dan Buck, the nonprofit foundation's executive director.

Sarah Palin, who has a new book out "Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas," posted on Facebook: "ESPN, you've come a long way, baby... from your known wholesome, bold Americana "persona" to now being afraid to support freedom and not being bold enough to allow acknowledgement of the "Reason for the Season." So disappointing. Well, I hope you guys catch and enjoy the Christmas spirit anyway!"

Bill O’Reilly also has a new book out: "Killing Jesus: A History"

The ad is scheduled to run Saturday on ESPNU during a basketball game between Virginia Commonwealth and Northern Iowa. The Missouri Valley Conference, which works with the charity, donated the air time.

Buck said ESPN's vice president of communications, Josh Krulewitz, told him by phone Thursday that the ad could air.

"He said: 'We decided to take a harder look and it is well within the standards. We apologize for the mix-up,'" Buck said of his conversation Krulewitz. "I said: 'I appreciate you making the right decision. America will be happy you made the right decision, and I'm sorry it came to this.'"

Krulewitz provided a similar explanation to the newspaper.

"This decision is consistent with our practice of individual review of all ads under our commercial advocacy standards," he said.

Buck said the ad has been broadcast on local stations without incident. He said the message didn't advocate Christianity but was "simply professing our faith. ... We celebrate our mission. It's the core of who we are."

Before ESPN's reversal, the foundation provided an alternative version containing no holiday message but instead focusing on Cardinal Glennon's work treating children's heart conditions.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to ESPN rejects, then OKs Christmas charity ad
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2013/1214/ESPN-rejects-then-OKs-Christmas-charity-ad
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe