RE: Online Community

The video Matt posted was interesting. I was especially struck by what Hipps said about looking for people who agree with you online. In a PBS video, Growing up Online, that was a major thing young people said they liked - being able to find people online who were like them, when they felt misunderstood in their real world communities.

We had an interesting conversation related to this in class this week. There was a youth pastor who said he had grown their youth group largely due utilizing online communities, such as a Sony community. He noted how it created another way to connect with the kids, since often they would share things more freely online than they would in real life. He did say, however, that you need the real life interactions in addition to the online. (Someone else I talked to said there's also a problem when the kids will share something online but are unwilling to talk about the same thing in person.)

Someone brought up the example of Christ - how he could have chosen to connect to people on a mass scale, but he chose to come in a physical body to a few people. But another person also noted how there was a form of technology even in the early church - Paul wrote letters that he sent to the churches. He wasn't there physically, but still managed to have influence and some form of relationship with a large number of people from a distance. (Although he did say he wished he could see them in person!)