Faith It
Faith It's About Us page starts off with this daring statement:
"What would happen if millions of people worked together to express their faith online, every day, by sharing the most cause-driven, faith-based and inspirational stories with their friends? Our mission is to find the best stories with the potential to make a real difference in the world by encouraging the faith of others or mobilizing a movement."
Unfortunately, there are more than a handful of videos featured on Faith It's website that deviate from this vision. Many of the videos are not inherently problematic, but rather suffer from being brandished with intentionally misleading titles.
This Scientific Study Proves It-Obeying the Bible Is Good for You.
First and foremost, it seems as if the title of this video is attempting to reconcile the divide between science and religion. Second, nowhere in the video is there any mention of the Bible or religion. Instead, the original video is titled "The Science of Kindness." Instead of using a title that appropriately reflects the content of the video, Faith It decided to brand the video with a sensational and controversial title in an attempt to draw in more viewers. It seems rather under-handed and manipulative when a self-proclaimed faith-based website uses non-faith-based content to promote its cause. Kindness is not a concept that is found exclusively in the Bible, and to imply that this is the case, and that kindness can only be achieved through "obeying the Bible," is disingenuous. If Faith It truly seeks to promote a culture of kindness, which, as they claim, is inherent to the Bible anyway, why shroud this message in deception? After all, if kindness is based in faith, then promoting kindness is promoting a principle of faith.
We Thought We Knew What This Video Was About and Then Wham! It Hit Us Between the Eyes with a Powerful Illustration of God’s Love
Before watching this video, I would never have guessed that its focus would be on dogs. With this particular title, Faith It sneakily yet unabashedly equates God's love to the love shown by our canine companion.
This World God Created Is a Crazy-Beautiful Place–Don’t Forget to Check It Out
Promoting global culture using the single viewpoint of creationism? Attributing all the wonders of this earth to a higher being? Don't even get me started.
He Looked Outside to See a Man Eating His Own Excrement. What He Did in Response Will Never Be Forgotten.
Unlike the previous videos, this one does not feature a misleading title. However, it does feature this caption: "In Bangalore, India, homeless, mentally disabled and old people are often left uncared for and abandoned. But this extraordinary man shows them Christ’s love by meeting their basic needs." Again, nowhere in the video is there any mention of religion or Christ. Since the man in the video did not explicitly mention his religious affiliation, portraying his service to others in religious terms feels like exploitation. This man was motivated not by Christ, but by human instinct.
"What would happen if millions of people worked together to express their faith online, every day, by sharing the most cause-driven, faith-based and inspirational stories with their friends? Our mission is to find the best stories with the potential to make a real difference in the world by encouraging the faith of others or mobilizing a movement."
Unfortunately, there are more than a handful of videos featured on Faith It's website that deviate from this vision. Many of the videos are not inherently problematic, but rather suffer from being brandished with intentionally misleading titles.
This Scientific Study Proves It-Obeying the Bible Is Good for You.
First and foremost, it seems as if the title of this video is attempting to reconcile the divide between science and religion. Second, nowhere in the video is there any mention of the Bible or religion. Instead, the original video is titled "The Science of Kindness." Instead of using a title that appropriately reflects the content of the video, Faith It decided to brand the video with a sensational and controversial title in an attempt to draw in more viewers. It seems rather under-handed and manipulative when a self-proclaimed faith-based website uses non-faith-based content to promote its cause. Kindness is not a concept that is found exclusively in the Bible, and to imply that this is the case, and that kindness can only be achieved through "obeying the Bible," is disingenuous. If Faith It truly seeks to promote a culture of kindness, which, as they claim, is inherent to the Bible anyway, why shroud this message in deception? After all, if kindness is based in faith, then promoting kindness is promoting a principle of faith.
We Thought We Knew What This Video Was About and Then Wham! It Hit Us Between the Eyes with a Powerful Illustration of God’s Love
Before watching this video, I would never have guessed that its focus would be on dogs. With this particular title, Faith It sneakily yet unabashedly equates God's love to the love shown by our canine companion.
This World God Created Is a Crazy-Beautiful Place–Don’t Forget to Check It Out
Promoting global culture using the single viewpoint of creationism? Attributing all the wonders of this earth to a higher being? Don't even get me started.
He Looked Outside to See a Man Eating His Own Excrement. What He Did in Response Will Never Be Forgotten.
Unlike the previous videos, this one does not feature a misleading title. However, it does feature this caption: "In Bangalore, India, homeless, mentally disabled and old people are often left uncared for and abandoned. But this extraordinary man shows them Christ’s love by meeting their basic needs." Again, nowhere in the video is there any mention of religion or Christ. Since the man in the video did not explicitly mention his religious affiliation, portraying his service to others in religious terms feels like exploitation. This man was motivated not by Christ, but by human instinct.
Aside from the deceptively-titled videos, Faith It's website also features videos that have seemingly no relation to a particular cause, inspiration, or faith. For example, this viral video depicting an April Fool's prank on a teacher, while humorous and good-natured, has little potential to encourage one's faith or mobilize a movement. If anything, a viewer may remember the video for a day or two, enough time to send it to a friend and share another laugh. However, in the long run, there is no progress being made, nor awareness being raised. I, like most others in this day and age, appreciate a good chuckle from a viral video; of course, there is nothing inherently harmful about this. The real problem is that Faith It included this video in its repertoire of "stories with the potential to change lives." In fact, Faith It contradicts its very own principles of ignoring "all those cute cat and prank videos" and "consuming the Internet." Faith It deviates from its mission when it is convenient to do so, by promoting feel-good videos that increase traffic to their site without making any kind of lasting impact on their viewers.