The Jesus-focused “He Gets Us” ads that aired during Sunday’s Super Bowl LVII were funded in part by groups that donated sizable sums to anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion efforts, according to reports.
The ad campaign promoting Christianity is part of the Servant Foundation, a nonprofit organization that provided more than $50 million to the conservative Christian group Alliance Defending Freedom from 2018 to 2020, the political magazine Jacobin reported.
Alliance Defending Freedom is described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “hate group” that’s spread lies about the LGBTQ community and supported laws against LGBTQ rights, according to a 2020 article published by the law center.
Donors who support “He Gets Us” aren’t publicly disclosed on the campaign’s website.
“Funding for the campaign comes from a diverse group of individuals and entities with a common goal of sharing Jesus’ story authentically,” a spokesman told CNN.
Hobby Lobby co-founder David Green, who has regularly supported Christian campaigns, has been vocal about his support of “He Gets Us.” In 2014, Hobby Lobby won a Supreme Court battle to allow closely held businesses to avoid a federal requirement to provide contraceptives to employees.
Green teased in November that the “He Gets Us” ads would air during the Super Bowl.
“We’re wanting to say ‘we,’ being a lot of different people, that he gets us,” Green said during an interview with Glenn Beck. “He understands all of us. He loves who we hate so I think we have to let the public know and create a movement, really.”
The “He Gets Us” website says the campaign isn’t aligned with a political party or any denomination of Christianity. It’s “a movement to reintroduce people to the Jesus of the Bible,” the website says.
A separate website targeting churches and other partners shares that same sentiment, but says organizers “generally recognize the Lausanne Covenant,” a 1974 manifesto associated with evangelism.
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