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The 11/2/09 edition of The New York Times had a piece on churches that hold services on the internet. It's fairly brief, and you can read it here.
There are no new revelations in the article (except the aside that one church has a tab on which you can click to receive Christ as your savior), but it does a good job laying out the thinking behind these internet churches.
We've talked about this phenomenon before, but I wonder how it connects to the conversation about multi-site churches. Could it be that these internet churches are just churches that have the courage to take the multi-site approach to its logical conclusion?
The multi-site approach sacrifices connection and community in the interest of making good, redemptive content available to as many people as possible. That's a deliberate trade-off and there's legitimate debate about whether or not it's worth it.
Doesn't the internet campus model take the same thinking and tease it out to the end? If you're willing to sacrifice physical proximity for the sake of reaching more people, isn't the internet the perfect option? Can't you consider each laptop a new campus?
In any sort of debate (like the are-multi-site-churches-a-good-idea debate) extremism seems to be an easy card to play. Sure, multi-site churches could go to the extreme of having each laptop be a "campus" and anyone with their head screwed on would know that would be a bad idea. But use the same principle on a church's building renovation: Does CHBC's renovations justify building a worship center the size of the Super Dome? Of course not.
So far for me the multi-site issue seems to be one of wisdom and stewardship. I personally think it's not the wisest idea nor the best way to steward resources and leadership, but these take-it-to-the-extreme arguements I don't think will work.
Posted by: C.T. | Nov 10, 2009 5:09:44 PM
CT,
I'm not sure that I agree. I think if you can show that a set of principles can be applied consistently to justify something ridiculous, you've said something significant about those principles.
I'm not saying that I've shown that conclusively regarding multi-site churches, but that's the tree up which I am barking.
Warm regards,
mike
Posted by: Mike McKinley | Nov 11, 2009 3:17:58 PM
There are lots of valid critiques of multi-site but I highly doubt that it will lead to internet churches. You might make a "logical" connection but I don't think you are making a reasonable one.
Posted by: Chad | Nov 12, 2009 6:50:17 AM
Thanks Chad. I agree that not every multi-site church will go to an internet campus.
Above you say: I highly doubt that it will lead to internet churches.
Can't we say that it already has? Each of the churches with an internet campus went multi-site first. Once they bought into that system, they went the next step to an internet campus. I think they are related in their premises.
Posted by: Mike McKinley | Nov 12, 2009 3:44:36 PM