Pastors are flocking to Facebook, Twitter

By Rachel Revehl (Fort Myers, Fla.) News-PressAfter wrapping up a sermon on the evolution of Christmas rituals on a recent Sunday, Pastor Corey Baker reached for his cellphone and posted a Twitter update.The leader of First Assembly West, a small church in Cape Coral, Fla., Baker has Twitter account, Facebook page, YouTube channel and iTunes podcasts and blogs.

"I feel my job as a pastor is to connect and network with people," he says. "That's what all this does."

Religious social media use is flourishing, as much in smaller, more conservative worship centers as in the megachurches, says Sarah Pulliam Bailey, online editor of Christianity Today.

Concern that social media media will detract from people gathering for worship together is vanishing, she says.

"You have to proceed with caution like anything else," Baker says. "It's not Facebook that causes those issues, it's people."

Social media use hasn't won universal blessings from religious leaders. Last month, a New Jersey minister called Facebook a marriage killer. A group of New York rabbis blogged about whether people should "fast from Facebook" during Passover. And last year, Pope Benedict XVI warned Roman Catholics not to allow virtual connections to overshadow real ones.

Seattle-based Mars Hill Church, with more than 10,000 members at nine locations, is a robust user of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, church spokesman Nick Bogardus says. Pastor Mark Driscoll has a following of about 160,000 on Facebook and Twitter, and the church draws about 60,000 friends and followers on those media, Bogardus says.

At its best, social media "opens an opportunity to build a real relationship," Bogardus says.

As an example, he mentions a single mother and first-time church visitor who posted a thank-you for the sermon on Facebook the following Monday.

"Pastor Mark followed up with a note to her saying, 'Please find me or another minister the next time you visit, so we can get better acquainted,' " Bogardus says.

For Rabbi Jeremy Barras of Temple Beth-El in Fort Myers, Fla., Facebook is a great way to connect with younger synagogue members.

"It's amazing because you could call or e-mail them, and you'd never hear back," Barras says. "But post them a note on Facebook, and you hear back from them in a moment."

Religious leaders throughout history have seized on new technology, from the printing press to TV and radio, says Professor Dell deChant, senior instructor and associate chairman of religious studies at the University of South Florida in Tampa. But the digital age, he says, appears to be having a unique impact.

"Social networking tends to have a democratizing influence. Everyone gets a say, and that's not usually the way religion works," deChant says.

Howard Coachman, 59, a member of First Assembly West, says having his pastor as a Facebook friend reminds him to self-edit.

"It keeps me from going out and getting in the weeds, because I think, 'Pastor Corey might read this,' " Coachman says.

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