This Lent, give up products that are inferior to our product
I try not to get too worked up about the commercialization of church holidays. It seems inevitable in our culture, in which most people are at least nominally Christian yet the real national faith is capitalism. The Christmas shopping season is annoying and the Easter candy aisles are dangerous, but it's futile to rail against things that are more symptom than illness.
It is pretty perplexing, however, when marketers try to capitalize on Lent. It'd be bad enough if they latched onto multiple aspects of the season, including the more positively defined ones we Protestants tend to emphasize: let our renewing facial cream invigorate you as you seek spiritual renewal! With these new walking shoes, you can walk with Jesus in comfort and style! Turn from sin on a dime in the best-handling car in its class!
Instead, the only keyphrase people come up with is "give up." Lent = the time you give stuff up. Just ask Twitter, where yesterday people were giving up stuff—in earnest and in jest—left and right. And some marketers saw an opportunity:
