Tattooed Jesus Billboards Flood Lubbock
by SONIA SMITH
THU OCTOBER 10, 2013 12:37 PM
Lubbock, a city where churches outnumber tattoo parlors 25 to one, has some new billboards that combine the love of religion and ink. The billboards feature a hirsute Christ with words including "outcast," "jealous," and "faithless" tattooed on his body and outstretched arms.
An anonymous group has erected 59 of the billboards in a fifty-to-sixty mile radius of Lubbock, according to a spokesperson for the group, speaking to Texas Monthly on condition of anonymity. The billboards went up on September 30 and are set to stay up for four weeks. The billboards direct people to visitjesustattoo.org, where they can watch videos and learn more about Christ.
"This idea was a creation of a group of people that who were humbled by the love of Jesus and they just wanted to share it with everyone, both churched and unchurched, in a creative way," the spokesperson explained.
The group is being coy about its identity. On their website they refer to themselves as "a small group of people humbled by the love of Jesus. We are not a church. We are not selling anything. We encourage you to tell as many people as possible. That’s it." The domain name was registered through a proxy service, making it harder to trace, but this appears to be a well-financed marketing campign designed to go viral. We wouldn't be surprised if there were a tech-savvy megachurch somewhere behind the effort.