Intranets Can Support an Interactive Church
By Frances Forde Plude
[These reflections appeared in the 1995 Unda-USA Newsletter.]
Church leaders are studying communication flows at local and national and international levels to see what cyberspace networks can teach us about being interactive church communities. This will prompt new challenges for communication directors, already under siege by technological change and decreasing budgets.
In addition, churches are finding that internal communication (the intranet) enriches their faith community and daily lives.
I have been invited by bishops in several states to give workshops (attended by the bishop, the chancellor and key diocesan personnel) so strategic planning can incorporate new technologies. One diocesan official noted: “I feel my anxiety level rising as I realize we must implement new ways to communicate within the church.” This individual later told his bishop: “You must accept this communication challenge as we become a more interactive church community.”
What does this mean specifically for communication directors? There are substantive changes underway. Here are a few:
Organizations (including church structures) find communication patterns changing. There is much more emphasis on communication-as-exchange rather than exclusive emphasis on “sending information out.” Communication directors will have to be facilitators of these communication flows – with the help of new technological tools.
Church leadership (like in organizations generally) will need to become more collaborative. There will be much more pooling of communication work because the technology facilitates it and because tight budgets require it. Many churches plan to have all office heads meet monthly to coordinate their communication efforts, planning an on-line newsletter to facilitate information flow.
While churches might move toward more paperless organizations, a deeper theological development is occurring. Communication Theology as a developing field is beginning to articulate the links between theology and over eighty years of research and practice in communication studies.
There is a natural affinity between sacrament and symbol, between Scripture and a self-communicating God, between language and how we live as faith communities. Recently at the Catholic Theological Society of America the annual Communication Theology session featured a discussion of storytelling – narrative theology. [Note: there is a special section in this book entitled ParishWorks where numerous essays elaborate on specific connections between theological concepts and local congregational practices.]
So, as many churches scramble to get a home page out in cyberspace, perhaps a deeper change is underway in local congregations: churches are finding that internal communication (the Intranet) will alter and enrich their faith communities and individual daily lives. It will require much strategic and coordinated planning for churches in the 21st century.