Every once in a while I read a blog post somewhere that is so completely relevant to my life or work that I have to resist the urge to sweep my home and office for listening devices. Jon Swanson, of the Levite Chronicles, wrote just such a post this morning.
His story of a “social media pastor” named Emilio faced with the metaphor of box pews illustrates brilliantly the challenges we face in the realm of church communications in the 21st century.
A few excerpts:
As he stared at them, Emilio pictured the cubicles in his own church, and in many other churches. This time they weren’t around families. They were around generations, around interest groups, around social strata. There were groups that went into their cubicles every Sunday, with walls around them.
And he knew that they were trying. There were weekly bulletins, biweekly mailers, web updates, a facebook group, Sunday school class email prayer chains. There were displays in the hallways, announcements in the services, notes on clipboards in classrooms. There was a limited circulation enewsletter. There were hundreds of pieces of information. And there were people who said they never heard what was going on who, when questioned, acknowledged that they didn’t read the newsletter.
I highly recommend that you visit Jon’s blog and read the article (it’s not long) and leave a comment there (or here) about the manifestation of the box pew metaphor in your own church.
link: http://levite.wordpress.com/2008/11/19/emilio-and-the-box-pews/
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