An official from Crossroads Church said they were not starting a free-speech argument with major tech companies over a video depicting Jesus, but the headline of an article on their website mentions some giants on social media. media because they used the word ‘censor’.
The church said technology giants Facebook and YouTube had temporarily blocked an Easter video showing versions of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
The church claims that the platforms marked the videos for violence in a post on its website.
“We had to make some small adjustments with our online Easter service to use the video in the way we had hoped on some social media channels,” Kyle Ranson, Crossroads church pastor in the church, said in a written statement.
Facebook and YouTube did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The incident sparked talks on various topics, Ranson said.
“We are not so much interested in making a statement about freedom of speech, but we also want to focus on the value of Jesus’ cruel crucifixion and what it tells us about how deeply God loves each of us,” he said. said.
Ranson continues: “The intention to share what happened was to create understanding and not to condemn social media ventures.”
The church has six locations around the Greater Cincinnati area, one in Dayton, Ohio, and three in central Kentucky, including one in Lexington.
Brian Tome, the senior pastor at Crossroads, made the nearly 50-minute video available on the church’s website. The video features scenes of a man depicting a bloodied Jesus Christ carrying the cross and close-ups of a wooden peg being driven in the wrist while music is playing.
There are songs, dance performances, first person testimonials and Tome’s preaching.
The church said in its website that social media companies on Thursday night rejected ‘notices’ about the fact that they were benefiting from a tragic event with no clear benefit to users. The church’s message, written by Ranson, notes at the end that Facebook and YouTube have agreed to point the scenes to a career process.
‘Facebook and YouTube have censored our Easter video’, was the title of the website which gets the idea that there can be resurrection without suffering and the crucifixion.
Crossroads pointed out that they edited a portion of the church’s Easter video tagged by COVID-19 for misinformation with a reference to the negative health consequences of the pandemic.
“We just agreed with their findings and we sympathize with the difficult experience that many of us have had over the past year,” Ranson wrote on the church’s website. “Finally, we processed the section to make sure we had an Easter video released in time.”