What would Jesus blog? This was among the questions considered by a conference of God bloggers in California recently, which heralded their growing numbers as potentially the most important development in the spread of Christianity since the Gutenberg printing press began churning out bibles in the 15th century.
The gathering at Biola University in the United States brought together about 135 Christian bloggers to discuss topics ranging from their relationship with the traditional church to their growing influence on mainstream politics.
Blogs — online diaries or commentaries — are at the vanguard of a new personal publishing revolution outside the mainstream media. A recent poll carried out for The Guardian by pollsters ICM showed that a third of all young people with access to the Internet in Britain have launched their own blog or website.
Joe Carter, author of evangelicaloutpost.com and one of the delegates at the conference, compared Christian blogging to the 95 theses said to have been posted by Martin Luther on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg nearly 500 years ago that launched the Protestant Reformation in Europe.
”It’s like putting 95 blogs out there,” said Carter, who added that God bloggers offer an ”uncensored and unadulterated” view of contemporary Christian thought on politics and organised religion.
Some commentators believe the growth of religious blogs will have political ramifications in the US. Christian conservatives make up the Republican ”base” that was primarily responsible for putting George W Bush in the White House, and the God blogging phenomenon could make them an even more effective political force.
Matt Anderson (23), the coordinator of the God Blog Convention, said one of the goals of the conference was to see whether God, Christian-oriented blogging and politics were a good marriage, and if so, how they should match up. — Â