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Churches Use Twitter To Reach a Wider Audience

In an attempt to reverse declining attendance figures, many American churches are starting to ask WWJD in 140 or fewer characters. Pastors at Westwinds Community Church in Michigan spent two weeks teaching their 900-member congregation how to use Twitter. 150 of them are now tweeting. Seattle's Mars Hill Church encourages its members to Twitter messages during services. The tweets appear on the church's official Twitter page. Kyle Firstenberg, the church's administrator, said,"It's a good way for them to tell their friends what church is about without their friends even coming in the building."

3 of 169 comments (clear)

  1. Oh, good by cml4524 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    I used to get dragged to church as a child, but our church was a dinky little thing in a podunk town of no consequence full of geriatric hillbillies. Sunday school rarely consisted of more than a gripe session, lead by the head hillbilly who worked in the "big city" (of about 120,000) over the mountain. The sessions generally revolved around the most recent topic Agnes had heard on the nightly news, which usually meant I sat their for an hour listening to people with multiple missing teeth bash immigrants, gays, liberals, and basically anybody - other than the group leader - who had been more than 10 feet past the county line in any direction in the past 30 years.

    I guess what I'm saying is, my church-going experience was largely shaped by ill-informed, shrill idiots with minimal exposure to the outside world and strong opinions on things they had no capability to understand, so I really can't think of a more fitting place to send them than the Internet.

  2. Re:On the fence on this by tomhudson · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    The failings of the other people in the church shouldn't matter to you.

    How about the many failings of the book they claim to believe in as "the truth"? And those who push that particular purple Flavor-Ade.

    Otherwise, you're just treating the symptoms, not the problem.

    And, more on-topic - if, after a couple of thousand years, they STILL haven't found a way to get their message out in a credible fashion, twittering ain't gonna help. It's just more "make us feel like we're doing something good for Jebus" feel-good crap for their own, because they're scared - atheism is the fastest-growing belief, and will ultimately eat their lunch, no matter how much they try to be angelic little Tweety-Pies.

    Q: Jesus, The Virgin Mary, and Sarah Palin fall off a sky-scraper. Who hits the ground first?
    A: Who gives a f*ck!
    A2: Sarah Palin - she saw someone wearing a fur coat and decided to "take that wolf out!"
    A3: The CEO of CountryWide Financial (we can dream).

  3. Re:On the fence on this by tomhudson · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    And another one of your errors: The "hatred" against gays, murders etc is not against them personally, but the lifestyle itself; big difference

    No difference. Their "lifestyle" as you call it, is part and parcel of who they are. If bigots can't accept it, that's their problem, but there are hundreds of species of mammals that engage in same-sex relationships. It's normal. Get over it.

    Try this: "the 'hatred' against blacks isn't against them personally, but against their skin colour: big difference". Nobody would buy it.

    Or this "The 'hatred' against pedophiles and child molesters isn't against them personally, but the lifestyle itself; big difference". Nope, doesn't pass the smell test.

    Let's try again. "The 'hatred' against Maddof isn't against him personally, but the scam he pulled; big difference." Major fail.

    The "love the sinner, hate the sin" self-justification of some people when trying to white-wash their bigotry and ignorance is what's shameful. Gays and lesbians don't go around telling fundies that they have no right to have sex with each other. It's the bible-thumpers who need a lesson in tolerance and loving.

    Then again, that would go against their "beliefs". Beliefs that have no basis in history (it's a bunch of regurgitated fables mixed with exaggerations - get over it), science, or ethics, and is bereft of any morality save its' own self-indulgent depravity.