Faith Playing a Strong Role in Digital Advancement

Since the advent of the Internet, the world has been completely altered. Advertising has changed, as we’ve come a long way from the first plane banner ads of the early 1920s and now are marketing brands on the moon. The auto industry has drastically been reshaped by the Internet, too, as have healthcare, entertainment, and just about every other industry.

Religion, on the other hand, has preferred a more traditional program and, aside from a few websites, blogs, and social media sharing, has relatively trailed in the digital world. That is, however, until now, as the church begins expanding in the digital realm.

“Trends in social media and apps are changing religion,” said Heidi Campbell, author of Digital Religion and associate professor of communication at Texas AandM University. “For faith organizations and communities, lack of digital literacy these days means you don’t exist.”

According to The Guardian, the Church of England recently launched a new website, A Christmas Near You, that provides information on more than 34,000 carol services across the United Kingdom. The site allows visitors to enter in their postal code, select a service that appeals to them — contemporary, traditional, kid-friendly — and share it among their friends and family members via social media.

Although cell phone and tablet apps have been extremely popular over the last few years and users can virtually do anything on their devices with ease, this is a relatively new platform for the church. The Church of England has been planning a “digital revolution” that allows the church to connect with a larger audience than it has ever seen before.

This has been a long-lasting process for many different congregations, although some aspects of digital religion have already seen widespread success. Pope Francis, for example, has acquired more than 10 million Twitter followers over a four-year period. The Pope has tweeted in nine different languages; he even personally approves each tweet before it enters the online world.

“We recognized that digital offers the holy grail of unmediated communication with the world, whereas before we were dependent on the traditional media to get our message to the wider world,” added Reverend Arun Arora, director of communications for the Church of England. “For centuries, church leaders stood in a pulpit and preached at a congregation. Now it’s about relationship, conversation, dialogue.”