We all need teammates...

It is July and that, generally speaking, has one main meaning for me... the start of the Tour de France.  I love it, I love cycling.  I used to race... a lot... and I loved it, and I just devoured anything I could find about bike racing.

And I said earlier that I love bike racing.  I should probably say I loved bike racing... past tense.  And it was the drugs that did it.  I ended up racing with some guys who raced against the big names (think, Lance).  And there was a massive gap between myself and these guys that was all due to natural talent.  But then I watched those same guys barely hold onto the main group against the European pro's and it was obvious that something wasn't right.

And so I got disillusioned and I stopped racing...

But the other day I was watching the tour again and explaining the tactics being employed by the teams on a mountain stage.  And my mother-in-law turned and said, 'wow, you really need a team to win this.'  And that sentiment often comes as a surprise to people who only see the individual glory of the winner.  They don't understand that there's a whole group of people blocking the wind for the leader, bringing the leader food, giving up a wheel or their bike to the leader if that's what's needed, sacrificing themselves so that somebody else can win.

So I actually got excited about the fundamentals of bike racing and I realized that it's a great analogy for how we are called to live as Christians.

We need a team.  Our lives are going to be more enjoyable, more fulfilling, more an expression of love and caring when we have a community around us to share in our lives.

When we go it alone, we generally don't succeed.  Watch any flat stage of a grand tour and you'll always see one guy or a couple of guys go off the front and try and launch a solo charge for the win.  With few exceptions, these always fail.  We are not called to live in isolation, but to live in relationships with others.

Sometimes we need to put others before ourselves.  We can't all be the leader.  Very often, we willing sacrifice our own wants and desires so that somebody else can achieve theirs.  That's what true love and caring entails, putting others ahead of ourselves.

Sometimes our leaders are servants.  Sometimes you will see a team leader give of himself to help a teammate win (this often is when the teammate is the stronger rider on the day, so the analogy kinda breaks apart here, but go with it..).  Christ is our leader who gave himself for our sake.  And that servant leadership is what we should aspire to.

So this whole post may be a 'Jesus Juke', but it was interesting to watch the Tour and think about how the interaction of the cyclists and the tactics being employed demonstrated so many real concepts about how I understand how we should act in our daily lives.

So did I got a step to far with this one?  Or did I leave something out?  Or do you really not care about cycling but would much rather hear my theories about football is popular because it reflects the way the world works?

The Power of Social Media

With all of the recent goings on in Egypt (See a good overview of articles from the BBC here), I was thinking about the role that social media played in organizing the initial uprisings last year and of how social media devices were used in Iran and elsewhere.

The power of these tools to help organize like minded people and to help them develop a sense of solidarity was/is amazing.  These are people who had/have been held down under rather totalitarian regimes for years (and yes, I recognize the massive differences between the situation in Egypt and the situation in Iran and I am not trying suggest that the experiences of the people in each country are same) and they would have very major challenges to organize and form the mass groups that actually succeeded in overthrowing the government in Egypt (thought I think the fact that the military largely stood by as a third party and let it happen probably had a lot to do with it too.  (and if you think that the military isn't the real power in Egypt, I invite you to look at the recent ouster of the democratically elected government and the replacement, on a 'temporary' basis, of ousted democratically elected politicians.

Digital media has let us see what was happening in these countries and spread the word so that when the governments attempted to crack down on protestors and turn off the internet, users in other countries came together in solidarity to figure out ways to keep the voices of the protest movement heard throughout the world.  In the case of twitter, users could phone in their tweets and they would be transcribe them and repost them for the world to see.  (This is also a great study of how large groups of people can convene temporarily to solve a problem and then disperse to do other things, new models of learning at work!)

So I think about how powerful a toold we have for engaging in world changing activities and I see people tweeting about where a star NBA player will sign, or complaining about the rain canceled their fourth of July fireworks, and it makes me wonder if people do realize what a massive powerful tool is literally at our fingertips.

I don't think people realize it.  It's been marketed as entertainment, but it's truly a tool of revolution.  It can be used to call out oppression, to organize for change, to help usher in a more fair and just world.

Or we can talk more about Kim and Kanye's baby.

What you do you think?  Tool or toy?

Proper posting or a 'Pinterest Pastor'?

So I stumbled across this article today about ‘Pinterest Pastors’ and had to read it.  Now upfront, I’ll say that I do not have a pinterest account and my familiarity with it comes entirely from my mother in law, who has an undying love for it and routinely shares recipes or other ideas with my wife and I.  My wife uses it to collect ideas like a virtual mood board when she’s designing shows, but that’s about it. 

That said, I think that the concerns that are raised about how pinterest can inspire both boasting and feelings of jealousy are well taken and I think that they apply to social media in general.  Depending on how we use social media, we can feel guilty and get depressed because our friends are all off at the beach or traveling the European countryside while we’re back home in the office for just another day. 

Or, we are always posting super trips we’re going on, talking about ourselves, and some more about ourselves, and then even more about ourselves before we wrap up the day with a post about ourselves. 

And really, nobody likes either person.  Both are so curved in on themselves (thanks, St Augustine!) that they can’t really participate in the outside world in a meaningful way. 

But, and here is the key thing, their biggest mistake is that they are not listening to others.  Their social media connections become a megaphone instead of a walkie-talkie.  They are lacking in balance.  While we don’t want to be a lurker, we don’t want to be the 500 foot billboard that blots out the sky.

So instead we need to listen, to hear what our friends are saying, be supportive of them, share our own stories, but not in a boastful way, and then listen some more. 

My wife says that when she is teaching theatrical design she will ask the students what the first three steps of the design process are.  She receives a variety of suggestions, but correct answer is to ‘read the script.  2. Read the script. And 3. Read the script.’  In social media the three primary rules are: Listen; listen; and listen. 

Then you can speak.

Are you a pinterest pastor?  (or a pinterest lay person?)

Racism, Paula Deen, and the Supreme Court

Professor Hess talks about the need to be actively anti-racist in her book and this is a sentiment that resonates with me.  And I was thinking about that this past week with the whole Paula Deen ‘scandal’ and the decisions by the Supreme Court that gutted affirmative action and the Voting Rights Act.  I haven’t seen a lot of people tie the two together, but think about it, the Supreme Court is effectively saying that, ‘no, race isn’t a problem in the country anymore.  We don’t need this crazy old provision to ensure access to silly things like job, education or the ability to participate in democracy.  We’re a post-racial society now!’  And then the next story says something to the effect of ‘Paula Deen was fired from the Food Network because of admitted use of the ‘N-word’.’ 

But remember kids, we don’t think racially anymore.  Really? 

Now, I’ll not try an pretend that I know if Paula Deen is a racist or not, but I do know that in the south, that term is still used and even if it was 20 years ago, she should have known then that it was wrong.  Though if she didn’t use the word, there has been recent footage of her suggesting that a black employee was as dark as the black backdrop he was standing against, and needed to move so that the people could see the assistant, and that suggests some kind of ingrained lack o awareness and insensitivity that is almost as bad as saying the n-word.  She may not be a racist, but damn, some of the stuff she has done (on film!) has been quite racially insensitive.

And so where are we today?  Well, we have people who grew up hearing the word and have realized, ‘wow, that’s hateful and wrong’ and are teaching their kids differently.  Unfortunately, we also people who don’t understand why it’s so offensive to refer to any group of people by a racial slur, or worse, actively wonder why ‘they can say it, so why can’t we?’ 

Why do you want to say it?  Also, have you ever heard of the concept of empowerment/disempowerment?  If they take ownership of a term, it might be less hurtful when an idiot like you says it. 

I have only ever known one person who I feel used the word without understanding it was mean, and that was my grandmother, who immediately after starting a story with, ‘you know, we had a ‘n-word’ family that lived down the street from us.’ And then followed it up with, ‘I just don’t know why people were so mean to them.  They were just like us.  We are were just poor and trying to get along.  It just wasn’t right.’  I’ll also mention that she was in her mid 80’s and in the early stages of alzheimers, but I actually believe that at that point in her life she didn’t understand it was not a good term because of the alzheimers.  I don’t condone it, but a story like that is probably that one case I can think of.

But in spite of these attitudes, and in spite of the persistence of stereotypes in society, we’re told that the protections of the law are no longer needed, that we all truly have equal opportunity now, cause it’s a post racial society!

It bothers me.  It bothers me to watch people try and defend this racism and prejudice.  We have to stand up to this kind of quiet hate. 

But then sometimes I get discouraged and I think that perhaps Avenue Q had it right.. 

Oh, I will give the Supreme Court their due for doing the right thing regarding DOMA.

Is this the future of churches and technology?

So I came across this article about Joel Olsteen's use of social media in his evangelism and I'm curious to hear what others think about it.

Click 'Pray' to Pray: How Evangelical Megapastor Joel Olsteen is Saving Souls With Facebook

It's simple, just don't be a jerk

I generally am not a fan of ‘how to’ guides as they relate to technology.  Generally speaking, they are valid for about 10 minutes and then you find them in the clearance bin at the bookstore.  You know you’ve seen them, ‘How to win friends and influence people through Facebook’, ‘Tweet Your Way Thin’, and it’s sequel, ‘Tweet Your Way Rich’, and of course the ever popular religious version, ‘The Gospel According to YouTube.’  So it was with some skepticism that I approach ‘Net Smart’ by Howard Rheingold. 

However, I was very excited to see that he primarily viewed online interactions from a more systems level perspective and looked at how relationships in a virtual world develop, are nurtured and how those relationships can be leveraged to allow for greater learning by all in this world.  Rheingold looks at the growth of the online environment and discusses how a person can viably exist and participate in the digital world.

Social Media and Malaria

I am fortunate enough to be a part of a church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), that is actively engaged with the world around it.  They fund missionaries, train native citizens in their home country, assist with disaster relief, and advocate for justice, freedom and peace. 

One of the ways that the church is very visibly engaged right now is through the ELCA Malaria Campaign.  We are committed to raising $15 million by 2015 to fund the treatment and prevention of education and to train citizens to provide care and education to their fellow citizens.  A great cause committed to help end a disease, a preventable and treatable disease, that kills around 655,000 people each year, primarily striking down the already poor and vulnerable in this world. 

In the service of this cause, I was asked to be my synod’s Malaria coordinator, helping to lead a team that will set our synod’s fundraising goal and help educate and promote the cause throughout the synod.  To that end, I’ve been thinking about how social media might help promote the campaign and expand the conversation beyond just the few people who were at the synod assembly and physically signed up. 

I was a social media atheist

Ok, let me start with a bit of a confession…

I was a social media atheist.  Don’t get me wrong, I love my Facebook account, I thought Twitter was ok, even though I was pretty much just a lurker, I never got into LinkedIn, but I didn’t feel they were really effective means of community and that any ‘community’ created there was in some not authentic and not as ‘real’.

I just didn’t believe.  These were toys and time wasting activities.  Facebook was nice to use to keep tabs on people and make sure that folks you had somewhat lost touch with over the years were still ‘ok’, but it was a toy, not a tool.  And certainly not a spiritual tool.

But I’m changing my mind…

I just finished ‘Click 2 Save’ by Elizabeth Drescher and Keith Anderson and they lay out a very convincing argument and provide concrete examples of how social media can be used to unite people into, effectively, a digital congregation, how it can be used to provide ministerial support to people all across the world, and how it can invigorate church.

It’s actually rather odd that I didn’t fully believe in the power of social media, I’ve been online since 1991 (yay for Prodigy!), been a part of multiple groups that really only knew each other via the internet and am currently part of a Distribute Learning Cohort in Seminary.  Plus I wholeheartedly endorse a model of learning that acknowledges that more effective learning occurs when all participants are acknowledged as having something valuable to contribute and learning is an active event of sharing, and not a passive event where students receive without question and without regard to their own personal experiences.

So even despite all of that, I still viewed social media tools like Facebook and Twitter as being yet another way for a person or an organization to ‘push’ information to people, not as a vehicle for conversation.  In the terms of Drescher and Anderson, I saw it as another form of broadcast media (34-35).  I failed to understand how these tools can, if properly used, draw people into a community and strengthen existing communities by providing another opportunity for connection.

It’s easy to dismiss the effect that a short message, a ‘like’, or a retweet can enrich somebody’s day, but when I think about how I feel when those things happen to me, I know it to be true.  And that is part of what Anderson and Drescher are saying, social media provides a way for people who may normally only interact with each other for a few minutes before or after a worship service to stay in contact throughout the week.  They learn more about each other and their sense of friendship with each other grows even while they are physically apart.  This effect happens multiple times over and soon the entire congregation is a stronger community. 

But what great about social media is that it expands the boundaries of the conversation by letting friends who may not be a part of the congregation, but are friends with me, to see interaction occurring within the congregational community and participate in them, effectively becoming part of the community themselves.

What’s great about Drescher and Anderson is that they not only set the stage with a great argument for ‘why’ social media is a good tool, they effectively demonstrate ‘how’ to go about using several of the more popular platforms and provide good goals and milestones for brand new users, moderate users and advanced users.  They take the ‘new’ and make it less intimidating.

They also talk a lot about the importance of maintaining a clear and consistent identity, of not assuming a voice or identity that is decidedly different from who you are outside of the internet (41-43) and how you might look to one of several areas to find a focus for communicating your interests and gifts in the world of social media.

The important thing in all of it is to see social media as another of creating relationships, not marketing, not trying to get more offering donations, but a way to create and strengthen real relationships.  The discuss the ‘LACE’ model of social media practices to quickly outline what should be kept in mind as engagement occurs (126-128).  The practices are Listening, Attending, Connecting, and Engaging and they, rightly so, are very focused on the larger group, there is not an aspect that focuses on ‘me’, but it is all geared to making others feel welcome and appreciated.

And I like all of that.  It takes principles that the church is supposed to encompass (welcoming, attentive, caring, focused on the needs of others) and provides another means of doing all that.  So I’ve become a believer (cue ‘I’m a Believer’ by the Monkees).

But what does that mean?  Well, I have begun to try and tweet at least once a day (@JonTrapp), I’m trying to be more consistent about my Facebook time and in engaging in that community more and more.  I’ve also begun a conversation with the rest of the worship team in my contextual congregation, House of the Rock, to talk about how we might use our hashtag #hotr2013, to have an ongoing notion of ‘prayers in community’.  Prayers in community is an activity that we often engage in during the time for ‘Prayers of the Church’ where we ask people to get in small groups and share their prayer requests with each other, and then pray together.  It’s actually quite powerful in creating relationships during worship, so it might be a good step in creating a more active digital ministry.  This idea is based largely on the examples provided on pages 139-141.

Are you already using social media in your ministry?  Is it working?  Leave a comment and help us all grow!

Games, Education and the Church

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Is this the future of education?

Who would have thought that World of Warcraft would ever have a place in a discussion about theological education?  Well, it does… kind of.  A better thing to say is that, according to Thomas and Brown, authors of A New Culture of Learning, argue that the type of learning that occurs in World of Warcraft and other massive multi-player online (MMO) games is indicative of how learning in general tends to occur in our world today.

More after the break...

                                                       

Digital Media, Education and Diversity

How can technology be used in a theological education setting?  Is it a force for good that can unite people across economic and social divisions or is just another way for a group with power to push a preset agenda and predetermined concepts to consumers? 

So I was somewhat unsure which of the four books to start reading first for this class, but then I realized that the obvious answer was that if your professor has written one of the books assigned, it’s probably a good idea to start there, and so I did.


More after the jump!

Introduction to EL 3517: Media and Technology in Parish Education

Media, technlogy and education.  I suppose that like a lot of my fellow gen-x brothers and sisters, my first exposure to the use of popular media for education purposes came from either Sesame Street or Schoolhouse Rock.  Schoolhouse Rock has probably had the most lasting effect me (I preferred to watch Cubs baseball games in the afternoons over Sesame Street) and tells me that popular media can be hugely influential tool for learning.  

(I'm including the Blind Melon version of this purely because I like their cover slightly more than the original)