Bodily remembering

Somebody said to me the other day that people carrying billboard advertisements is a thing of the past. Perhaps the speaker was right and maybe the minimum wage has something to do with the demise of such living adverts. Or is it that they've been replaced by the designer packaging and giveaway bags that we the customers now carry for free! I know someone who always refuses wrapping and free bags precisely because he refuses to be a free advertisement. The unprinted brown carrier-bag also seems to be a thing of the past. I was musing on these things when a friend showed me this:

Anyone wearing short shorts who sits on these particular benches in Auckland, New Zealand walks on with an ad for a store called Superette's sale of short shorts imprinted on their legs - at least temporarily.

Saint Paul said we carry everywhere in our person the death of Christ, so that the life of Christ may also be manifested in us. I'm tempted to change that 'in our person' to 'in and on our person'. Isn't he suggesting that we should be ourselves 'adverts' for Christ. I appreciate Paul couldn't have had in his mind the techniques of modern marketting, nevertheless surely he meant us to show Christ in all kinds of ways. Sharing the Christian memory requires making it obvious that we are holding something worth sharing. It isn't meant to be all 'inside,' only a matter of subjective ideas, values and feelings. It's also about what other people can see us carrying.

Collective memory mechanism:

Bodily things are important. Shared objects, actions, and places keep the memory living.