In talking a bit about Doug Pagitt's new book, Preaching Re-Imagined, I mentioned our forum, and it's importance in creating a progressional dialogue within communities.

The following are a couple of comments after that post:

Daniel Rudd said...
Bob, the think with online forums is that for some they become a replacement for human interaction instead of an extention of it. Then people "say" things online that they would never say to a real live human.

We invested a lot of hours into encouraging people to communicate appropriately, but by the time that was done, a few soapboxers had driven away most users.

Someone who has seen more success in this should publish some ideas on cultivating good online discussions.

5:42 AM


duckbill said...
...and then sometimes people say things online that they would never say to a real live human. At least not at first.

It cuts both ways. I often need the relative privacy of being able to compose my thoughts into cogent sentences in order to really be open about things too close to the bone for me to bring up in social conversation.

Our forum helps me be authentic and has fostered a degree of intimacy with those in our community that would have taken me years of face-to-face interaction to achieve. Now every Sunday I see people and I know who they are and they know things about me and we have meaningful conversations about those things.

The forum helps me initiate and develop my relationships with people. Because I'm just not that social in real life. But in an online sense...

I'm a postmaster.

:)
--Sean

9:31 AM


starla said...
If you don't mind Bob, I'm going to hyjack the blog and respond to Daniel (Dan?)

I really think that our forum at Evergreen works because of Bob's approach. It is really radical to see a pastor change his mind through a conversation. The fact that he doesn't need his thoughts/position to be perfect has had a profound impact on the community. I don't think our forum works because of any process. But, I think that it works because of Bob's character and openness. (Granted, there are limits to an online community, but for us the positive far outweighs the negative)

If I'm wrong, don't let me know.

So... first let me say: Thank you, Starla. Very, very nice thing to say. I do know that I believe the success of a church's forum is dependant on "leadership" showing up, and actually dialoguing with people. Not just teaching, though I think forums are an excellent channel for that in the life of a church, but actually modeling conversation, humilty (gulp!), and being a learner.

On Daniel's question and the issue of soapboxers. I think you have to make it a community thing that "we don't do that here." Keep repeating what you want the corporate culture of the board to be. Deal harshly with trolls. Respond quickly to some posts, but be willing to hang back and let others take the lead often.


Here are some thoughts I blogged a couple of months ago on this:

Our forum goes through periods of extreme activity and then takes a breather, and then back again... but by and large it's a pretty active one.

And it's been a huge part of building our community- I can't recommend it highly enough. If you talk about dialogue and consensus, but don't actually give people a space to do that...

For us, it's been like a radiator. If there's tension, it comes out (and usually gets resolved) there. It's been a teaching tool- questions can be asked, issues addressed... And it's been a huge community builder. I know more about the people in our community who participate on the forum because they participate, than I would be able to get to know through many, many personal interactions. It's a community relationship greenhouse.

What's amazing to me is that I've looked around at a lot of other church's forums, including some pretty big names in the emerging thing, and have seen some pretty... uh... inactive forums.

I can think of a couple of reasons why ours might be different.

From the beginning I pushed it. If we're doing something, the info is there, the map is there, the sign ups for food is there. I just decided this would be where our community business would get done.

Also- I've done my best as "pastor" to be present there. I think a lot of people have no idea who their pastor is, what he or she is like, how they think (other than through the weekly monologues)... this has given people access to me and me to them.

We have a lot of people in our church who sit in front of computers all day. :)

Anyway... if you haven't already, feel free to check it out.

I'd be interested in hearing from others- have these things been helpful for your communities? Do you have a forum? Active or not so active? Problems? Let me know...

So yeah... Hugely helpful to us. Not sure why I haven't been able to find more example of really rocking forums from emergent/esque churches...

I think ours is the most active I've found, other than here, from Horizon Church which just blows my mind with it's voluminous activity and is actually a good place to get ideas for discussion stuff for your forum... :)

This would be a good subject to do a paper on. Can anyone else point me to really active church forums from emerging churches?