Last full day on vacation, and I think I finally got this stuff going enough to know how to post stuff and then have it show up. I wrote some stuff yesterday:
The idea of the Web as an information search and retrieval mechanism; as a tool for research and science, is natural enough considering the beginnings and original purposes for the Internet. But not long after the connections began to sprout up across the country and the world, a conversational purpose arose. Usenet groups predate the INternet, sprouting up as if out of pure demand for conversation. Groups of BBSes, separated by geography and not interconnected, began to share discussions.
In these early days of Church's use of the Internet, the predominant use is email prayer lists and devotionals. Churches put their meeting times and calendars on the Web.
Information IS a valuable piece of content to put on the Web. We want the widest possible dispersement of information that is of value to our members, particularly as it concerns information that enhances the participation in vital Church programs. But just as with any information, it is a means to enable the experience. It is the support that leads to the event. The event is meant to put us in touch with something that the community needs to hear and act upon. While it is certainly a legitimate use of the Internet to disperse information that communicates and supports events for the Church, it is also a unique tool for keeping members in touch with the meaning of the events, and what learnings or callings come out of those events. Churches have long understood the value of Serendipity; the unexpected, and this is the motivation for continuing to meet, continuing to observe worship, continuing to enable a variety of ways to bring participants in and to provide settings and challenges and stories that have the potential to call forth from us that which is empowering and transforming.
