Jesus joins MySpace

Jesus Christ has joined MySpace with an online page advertising his love of beards, extreme water-skiing and the Life of Brian.

It's part of a campaign by the Churches' Advertising Network to provoke debate about God among young people this Christmas.

Posters showing the face of Jesus in beer foam in a pint glass will be accompanied by the question: "Where will you find him?"

The adverts will direct readers to myspace.com/isthisjesus - a page on the social networking site MySpace.

"It may be very arrogant to set up Jesus's MySpace," said Simon Jenkins, of Churches' Advertising Network. "But it is a voyage of exploration. Let's hope God is guiding it in the right direction.

"MySpace is hugely culturally significant. It is the place where young people are most likely to meet up and we need to go to our audience."

The charity, which has teetotal Salvation Army representatives and Methodists as well as members of the Church of England, denied that the pint-glass posters would encourage drinking.

Tony Miles, a Methodist minister, said: "Binge-drinking is a huge problem but this is an image that young people are familiar with and is meant to illustrate that you find God in unexpected places."

The group, which has no formal links with the Roman Catholic Church or the Church of England, has ruffled feathers in previous years by depicting Jesus as Che Guevara.

It has also portrayed the Last Supper as a boardroom meeting of multinational companies, with Judas as Microsoft.