Adverts are designed to infiltrate your life and influence your habits and decisions. Prefer this brand to that and buy this not that. Adverts are at the vanguard of consumerism. So what do we make of this?

There’s a tide of stuff flowing into your house, toys, goods, furniture stuff? This advert offers a solution. Sell some of it? Give some away? Buy less? Of course not, that would be ridiculous. Instead pay for more space, box up your stuff and put it in bigger box looked after by Big Yellow.

Why would people do this? Because our identity becomes wrapped up in our stuff, to get rid of our stuff means that somehow we are lessened, diminished and it forces us to face up to the pointlessness of trying to purchase meaning. In contrast Jesus said, ‘a person’s life does not consist in the abundance of their possessions’. (Lk 12:15)

Photo by Alan DFL