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Haber and Bosworth, Mr. and Mrs. Celebrate Church, Says Google

Last updated on 2014.02.24

An eager reader notes an odd Google quirk. Search "Celebrate Church," he suggests. I do, and here's what I get:

Google search results for "Celebrate Church" 2014.02.22
(Google screen cap, 2014.02.22; click to enlarge)

Celebrate Church in Sioux Falls tops the search results. To the right, we get the church's Google+ information: map, address, phone number, and a picture a nice couple, probably the lead pastor and her husband...

...wait a minute. That's not Pastor Loy. That's featured church singer Annette Bosworth and her committed if marginally employed husband Chad Haber. How nice! The church demonstrates its inviting, community-oriented, non-hierarchical structure by featuring photos of parishioners in its social media channels. Who else from the congregation do we find among their Google+ photos?

Celebrate Church Google+ photos, screen cap, 2014.02.22
Celebrate Church Google+ photos, screen cap, 2014.02.22 (click to enlarge)

Huh. Whoever was in charge of creating this strand of Celebrate Church's Web presence must have gotten tired or distracted or something, because who would ever create a church web page and post just one photo of one couple from the church, as if that one couple is somehow the face of the entire church?

This bit of unfinished Web business will surely make the humble Chad and Annette blush. Not wanting to create the false impression that they are the brand for Celebrate, I suspect the couple will chat with their church's social media guru tomorrow and remind her or him to finish up that project and populate that Google+ page with photos of all the Celebrate parishioners they can find. Quite the photo hound himself, Chad will probably volunteer to upload a bunch of pix of his fellow congregants straight from his iPhone.

Update 2014.02.24 12:01 CST: Within 36 hours of my posting on this topic, whoever controls Celebrate's Google+ account added another logo image to the church's photo page, thus supplanting the Haber-Bosworth photo as the lead image on Google search results. However, the Haber-Bosworth photo remains the only personal image on the Celebrate Google+ page.

18 Comments

  1. Rick 2014.02.22

    C'mon! This is too fakey!

  2. Nick Nemec 2014.02.22

    Strange, maybe cult like is a better term.

  3. caheidelberger Post author | 2014.02.22

    Rick, I only report what I find.

    Nick, I wouldn't apply the word "cult" to Celebrate (though I do think verbs make silly names for churches). I would apply it to whatever's happening at Haber's PHS.

  4. Nick Nemec 2014.02.22

    Maybe Chad does the web site.

  5. Robin Page 2014.02.23

    Ha, Ha, Ha! Maybe these two started the church for it's tax exempt status. Just another way to collect free money from well meaning parish members. I thought they were "Mormons" - from Utah.

  6. Rorschach 2014.02.23

    Jonathan Ellis just wrote the Bosworth article we've been waiting months to see from the media.

  7. Jim 2014.02.23

    A church could be profitable for them.

  8. Donald Pay 2014.02.23

    Yeah, I think I predicted this several months ago. Expect them to hide campaign donations behind a facade of "religious freedom," while they skim money to pay the "featured church singer.".

  9. Charlie Wheeler 2014.02.23

    The google + page only comes up if you do a search with celebrate church in quotes. If you look the church website, they are not listed as being on staff and I don't see a picture of them anywhere else. My first guess would be that someone started a Google + and didn't do any more with it. I clicked the link on featured church singer. You couldn't prove by me that she is the brunette in the pic. It would seem Cory, that your disdain for Evangelical Christians is overshadowing your thought process. Thank you for saying you would not apply "cult" to Celebrate. Not all Evangelical Christians run to the extreme far right. My guess would be that you will find those who fall into the wing nut category in most churches.

  10. Joan Brown 2014.02.23

    I always question these new off the wall churches that have strange names. That being said I also question the Evangelical/Pentecostal/Fundamentalist Christians too. I have known too many, including my sisters who in a round about way have implied I'm going to hell because I am a more liberal Christian. These people have basically turned me off organized religion. i will admit I have known a few Evangelicals that haven't been that way, but not too many.

  11. PNR 2014.02.24

    Celebrate is hardly new in S. Falls - 10 years or so. And although it doesn't advertise the fact, it's Wesleyan.

    I wouldn't say it's off the wall, either. Pretty standard church-growth movement stuff from maybe 30 years ago, slightly updated.

    Still, I wouldn't fault them for this. I highly doubt they see the Bosworths as stars to hitch their wagon to. Far more likely the other way around.

  12. Wayne Pauli 2014.02.24

    I have attended Celebrate a few times as our daughter and her family are members. I did not see any snakes or reasons to look down my nose at these folks. They seem happy with their religious choice and at least they are not meant to feel guilty like us Catholics...do I need to go to confession now?

  13. caheidelberger Post author | 2014.02.24

    Charlie, that short lady in the picture looks like her to me. I could be mistaken.

    Within 36 hours of my posting on this topic, whoever controls Celebrate's Google+ account added another logo image to the church's photo page, thus supplanting the Haber-Bosworth photo as the lead image on Google search results. However, the Haber-Bosworth photo remains the only personal image on the Celebrate Google+ page. PNR's hypothesis on who's hitching to whom seems plausible.

  14. caheidelberger Post author | 2014.02.24

    Should I choose to go to a house of worship, I'd like to know up front what flavor they are. Church's with verb names send me a signal that they may not be very clear about their doctrine. Churches that have a stage and a band send me a signal that they are offering a performance and not as communal, participatory experience as I might seek... if I were seeking God. If.

  15. Charlie Wheeler 2014.02.24

    I grew up in a church that was all about power. The power the people had who ran it. Now, I admit that people can find God in a denominational church, but I didn't. God seemed dead there. He was alive in a church that had a stage and a band. I like to worship with a livelier tune, but I also like the old hymns. Cory, I can understand your thinking about churches with a stage and a band, but not all churches that have them are about a performance.

  16. caheidelberger Post author | 2014.02.24

    Charlie, I'll bring my wife by when she earns her pastor wings to discuss the theology of church music with you. I'll stick doggedly to the proposition, though, that if your church is set up to look something like a rock concert, it's unavoidably a little less churchy than it should be.

    Annette and Chad, however, are a lot less churchy than they should be.

  17. Charlie Wheeler 2014.02.24

    Please don't think I am defending Annette and Chad. I am not and I wont. I was just talking about church and what I prefer. I like less churchy. I didn't say that people had to agree with me.

  18. caheidelberger Post author | 2014.02.24

    Don't worry, Charlie, I can keep those issues separate. But people like Chad and Annette who crave attention may gravitate toward churches that look like rock concerts. They may even fantasize about creating their own churches where they could fancy themselves superstars for the Lord.

    If I had to go to church, you what I might choose? A good Catholic mass. In Latin. Kyrie eleison! Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis!

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