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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."
its neither news for nerds or stuff that matters... car dealers, the president, software companies and buddhists use twitter.
if twitter had collaborated with jesus to produce an api through which church members could send prayers, that might be. or, if jesus intended to announce the rapture through tweet as stated in his microblog, i might care.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I'm a Christian, and I'm a tech. (I don't use twitter - I don't see a point to it). I do however, understand that this is another way to let people know what your particular church is about - on the other hand, I think this can be really distracting for those in the congregation that are trying to listen to the message for the day. I heard about this last week on K-Love (National Christian radio station) and will be interesting to see how it works out. (I don't see this lasting long)
The above comments are not guaranteed to make sense to anyone other than the author...
Mars Hill has been known for its controversy and new ways of doing things. Mark Driscoll (the pastor) has alienated a lot of mainstream conservative pastors out there. It's not surprising that he encourages his congregation to use new trends to expand his influence. He is drawing in a lot of younger audiences than most more established churches. We will see how long that lasts and if it some day implodes on itself like most of these trendy ministries kinda do.
I'm aware most of the people here probably don't practice a religion. I do. Troll on.
That said, this is ridiculous; just because a technology exists for something, you don't have to use it for everything. If you're truly interested in bringing your friends to (your) religion, Twitter's not gonna do it. You have to actually bring them into the building and break that ice by showing them that, no, you're not snake-handlers speaking in tongues or crazy terrorists preaching jihad or whatever. Besides, the reduction of religious beliefs to sound bytes by believers and non-believers alike is one of the most damaging processes to those who are religious. This will just end up backfiring on them and making them look like fools.
Those who anthropomorphize science and/or nature already believe in an intelligent designer.
We godless heathens dominate the internet. They're walking into a battle they cannot win.
*Maniacal laughter*
Isn't that the basic description of 6th generation American Protestantism in general? After all, you can't fill the megachurch with actual *SUBSTANCE* or *ORTHODOXY*- or even suggesting maybe being poor *might* be the fault of certain other groups taking more than they need.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
What would Jesus tweet?
OMG LOL WTF?! IT TOOK THEM 2 WEEKS 2 LRN TO TWEET. WTF IS THAT? ONE DAY 2 LERN TWITTER AND THE REST TO LERN TO MAKE POASTS LIKE THIS ONE?!?!?!?1
I believe the scientific process and theism go hand in hand. On the other hand, atheists have to be inconsistent with the outworking of their atheism. To use your language, the atheist not only has to make concessions but has to capitulate.
If you believe God orders and sustains the universe, what would be inconsistent with theism and science? Now inconsistent with science-ism? Yes.
Now an atheist who assumes that we weren't put here for any particular reason should assume that we weren't designed for any particular reason. We weren't designed to apprehend truth. The thoughts in our heads are just atoms bouncing around in our heads in accordance with the laws of physics & chemistry. The best you could say is that our mind is designed to pick up chicks.
So if we have no basis for assuming the truth of our thoughts, how is atheism consistent with science?
And it doesn't stop there. You have laws of physics hanging in mid-air not supported by anything. No reason to assume they will stay the same (see David Hume atheist philosopher if you disagree). You have immaterial laws of logic that a materialist tries to use.
And even worse you have people like Dennett who try to be consistent with their atheism and then go on to say that the concept of self is an illusion. But go the whole way and ask who is arguing what.
Frankly, I've never run into an atheist who operates completely consistently with his own atheism. It's an impossible task.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
Since I don't believe in any god and it's particularly sad to see churches trying to spread misinformation more effectively, I'd like to approach this topic constructively and point towards and interesting lecture I've seen lately that explains how and why religion evolved.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Does church now involve setting up torrents for The Passion of Christ?
Like "DO EXACTLY WHAT I TELL YOU, OR YOU'LL BURN!!!!!!"
Beyond that, could you define "best". Hinduism and Catholicism have a rather large number of adherents, for instance, and I'd hardly call them simple.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
As I recall, he would get tortured to death and then have his philosophy distorted for the purposes of power seekers for thousands of years afterwards.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."