The Pew study also reported that more than 3 million of us surf the Net daily for spiritual purposes. That makes cyber-spirituality more popular than online auctions, online banking or online dating services. People are using the Internet to enrich their prayer lives, commune with fellow believers, share their faith with non-Christians, and increase their understanding of Christianity's global nature. And contrary to popular opinion, the Internet wasn't luring Christians away from their regularly scheduled church services. The Internet, according to the researchers, "is a useful supplemental tool that enhances their already-deep commitment to their beliefs and their churches, synagogues, or mosques."

        An earlier study by Pew ("Wired Churches, Wired Temples," published in December 2000) found that clergy use the Internet quite differently. Most ministers don't see the Net as a space into which they can enter for community and relationship, but as a tool for research.

        When I went to Search Party 2002, a conference on postmodern ministry held just down the road from me in St. Louis, in May, I was expecting to connect with a different breed of ministers. I was expecting to meet pastors and priests who appreciated the Internet's ability to facilitate community. I'd been invited to the conference to conduct workshops on that very subject and to participate on an "e-tools" panel alongside such notables as author/futurist Leonard Sweet and Spencer Burke, founder of an online community for postmodern Christians called The Ooze. I figured everybody at the conference would be willing to dive right in to discussions of the Internet as community.

        I was wrong.

        Our panel fielded many of the same questions that church leaders were asking four years ago. "How can I make my church website cool?" "Should we have a message board on our site?" "How can we make our website ‘sticky'?" "How can I keep people from leaving my church to join a ‘cyberchurch'?" We also were put in the position of defenders of the Net as a resource for developing community. One participant claimed it was impossible to create authentic community over the Internet.

        I came away from that experience shaken and disillusioned. I thought that perhaps we had moved beyond the Big Question of the Internet -- the question of whether online community can exist. Howard Rheingold wrote the book on online community nearly a decade ago, and millions of Netizens are online proving that virtual communities can and do exist. While we in the church are still asking, "How can I make my website cool?" and debating whether or not people can develop relationships and community on the Net, some 3 million people a day are using the Net for spiritual purposes. Before Search Party 2002, I assumed most church leaders in the postmodern movement had gotten to the point where we could talk about how the Internet is radically reshaping lives, perceptions of reality, communication, community, relationships and culture. I left Search Party realizing that we are a long way from that point.

        We continue to ask the wrong questions about the Net. I'm not sure I know what the right questions are. But I know some different questions we could be asking. 

• -- Instead of asking, "How can I make my page cool?" or "How can I get more hits on our church website?" or "How can I establish community with our church website?" why don't we try asking, "How can we engage Internet culture by joining in on the conversations that are happening all over the Net?" or "How can we be a part of the community that already exists online?"
• -- Instead of talking about static billboards (websites) as "online ministry," why don't we talk about the dynamic conversations springing up all over the Net -- on blogs, in chat rooms, over instant messaging, on the various forums and Usenet newsgroups?
• -- Instead of trying to lure people to our websites, why not go out where the people are? Andrew Jones, one of the speakers at Search Party, emphasized that Jesus went out into the community of his culture. He went to the homes of tax collectors Matthew and Zaccheus, and gained the reputation of being a friend of sinners because he hung out with them so much. That seems to be a model of missional and mission-focused ministry that would work on the Internet.
• -- Why is the discussion about e-tools in the first place? Is the Internet just a tool, something we can use to manipulate and alter our surroundings, to carve out another niche in the world? No, it's space. It's more organic than mechanical. It's a place in which relationships can occur. It's at least that, if not more.
• -- Instead of debating among ourselves whether authentic community can exist over the Net, why don't we go out into all the world of cyberspace and be part of the community that does indeed exist on the Net? Who knows? Maybe the church can add some authenticity to what's out there.