First published: 14 July 1999; updated for Methodist Recorder/Joint Church Press, 26 August 1999
COMMUNICATION EVOLUTION
Some Christian and Luddite groups have derided the Internet as evil, but is television, are newspapers or books, inherently evil? No, they are media and can be used or abused. Christians took advantage of the lingua franca of the Graeco-Roman empire to spread Christianity, they were the first to use the printing press to get Bibles into the plain man's tongue - why should we be the last to catch up with the Internet communication revolution? Adam Clayton Powell III of
the Freedom Forum has said that "we're beginning to see penetration of the Net into places that haven't had television ... [or even] postal delivery" (reported in PC Direct, December 1998, p.586) - some in West Africa have satellite E-mail but no running water. "The Internet is simply the most powerful force in society", wrote Richard Tyrell in The Times, 2 March 1999, and we avoid it at our peril.
INTERNET GROWTH
Nearly 200 million people are now using the Internet, half of them in the USA, 20% in Europe and 15% in Asia. Nearly 40% of the US adult population uses the web, a two-and-a-half fold increase in 2 years. In the UK the figures are closer to 17% ahead of Germany's 10% but behind the Scandinavian countries such as Norway and Sweden.
A WORLDWIDE COMMUNITY
The Internet community or fraternity of 'Netizens' is also called the World Wide Web, these two names betray one of its more sociologically interesting facts, that of creating an online community, yet one that is widely dispersed across geographic, political and religious divides. It can bring together special interest groups that would otherwise be minorities and transform into worldwide groups numbering thousands rather than tens. I run a correspondence Biblical Hebrew
course (www.biblicalhebrew.com) which, apart from the Internet, would be a minority interest yet instead has attracted 200 students from 4 continents in just 18 months and received emails
from Siberia to Mexico.
YOUTH EXPRESSION AND CONFIDENCE
Many people, especially teens who feel that they have no voice, have found expression on the Internet through user profiles, chat rooms and home pages. The anonymity of the web means that people can communicate, debate or share interests without being judged on how they look or sound, the only qualification needed is the ability to type with two fingers. Internet technology has also been one area in which youngsters have gained confidence through knowing more than their parents did before they even finish their education. Apart from the voyeurs, shoppers and researchers, it is the lonely who use the web most. Margaret Wertheim's book The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace, Virago, argues that the Net actually grew in response to the psychological, social and spiritual vacuum of our modern age.
SEARCHING FOR GOD?
Using the Internet indexing search engine: www.lycos.co.uk (one of many, try also: www.yahoo.com or Christian search engines such as: www.robslinks.com, www.GOSHEN.net, www.crosssearch.com) one can search for "God" and many do. Fortunately, any seekers will come across the following top-ranked site, the makers of which I have met whilst studying at London Bible College, and this not only provides an Islam-Christianity debate but useful general Christian apologetics material:
answering-islam.org.uk
Who is God?
Who is God? The "I AM" - God's Story from Creation to Eternity The Attributes of God Noble Theology The Pursuit of God by A. W. Tozer (a classic) Is Allah the God of the Bible? Allah - The Supreme Being
http://answering-islam.org.uk/God/
(99% - 2k)
More like this
The next item in this particular search is typical of an online debate, in this case regarding the apologetic issue of God's accountability:
www.mailbase.ac.uk
postmodern-christian archives - June 1997: Re: God's Accountability
Re: God's Accountability Melvin McCauley (x91mccauley@wmich.edu) Mon, 23 Jun 1997 15:43:50 -0700 Messages sorted by: [ date ][ thread ][ subject ][ author ] Next message: Williamson, John: "RE: God's Accountability
http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists-p-t/postmodern-christian/1997-06/0099.html
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The next item was a piece of pleading poetry regarding the nature of God and one person's search for Him.
homepages.iol.ie
'Give me a God', By Janet Farrar
ARTICLES: Poetry GIVE ME A GOD Give me a God - a good God Who, tossing his antlered brow Embraces the Sun with his eyes. Not a savage God Bent by his wrath on punishing his children Like a bored infant...
http://homepages.iol.ie/~jsfarrar/giveme.htm
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Of course Internet search engines are relatively dumb animals so they also bring up those items that merely have God in the title, as in this school site:
www.iol.ie
Saint John of God School
Waterford Online Directory Index Community Industry Educational Services Shopping Saint John of God School Name Saint John of God School Address Passage Road Waterford Area Code 051 Phone 876255 Pages:
http://www.iol.ie/~pwright/waterford-online/c188.htm
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Also, containing 'God' in titles was a discography record catalogue where a particular record disc contained a reference to 'God':
fw4.iti.salford.ac.uk
Records containing "GOD" in comment
Records containing "GOD" in comment Compilation Albums Country Album Format Catalogue Comment Rating Status United Kingdom Now The Christmas Album LP contains "Thank God It's Christmas" common definit...
http://fw4.iti.salford.ac.uk/cgi-bin/andy/discography/concordance?god
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Another item in the top ten search list was a Banner of Truth Christian publisher's book title "The Sovereignty of God". With online book ordering of literally millions of titles available from Amazon (www.amazon.co.uk), BOL (www.uk.bol.com), Heffers (www.heffers.co.uk), etc., and specifically Christian book distributors such as CBD in the US (www.christianbook.com), there is no excuse not to get hold of any book you want. Second hand book sellers are also online such as the UK's largest secondhand Christian bookstore: Pendleburys (www.clique.co.uk/pendleburys).
www.banneroftruth.co.uk
Banner of Truth Title: The Sovereignty of God
Banner of Truth Title: The Sovereignty of God Home About News & Articles Contact Events Magazine Books By category By title By author THE SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD A. W. Pink A. W. Pink writes, 'From every ...
http://www.banneroftruth.co.uk/Books/20thCentury/sovereignity_of_god.htm
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Mouse clicking on More like this or any of the numbers . 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 5 . 6 . 7 . 8 . 9 . 10 will take you to further search results with gradually decreasing relevance.
INTERNET ACTIVITY
Pornography is usually cited as the most accessed area of the web, but surprisingly the search for medical information rates next with nearly a third of all enquiries. E-commerce (electronic shopping for books, CDs, travel and software) and religious/academic research probably follow next in importance. Youth surfers, 10% of all users and rising, claim that curiosity is enough to make them search the web without anything particular in mind.
INTERNET DANGERS
The dangers of pornographic sex and violence on the Internet are clearly present as are those of sects and cults. Instructions on bomb making, successful suicide strategies, anti-Semitism, and even anti-missionary activity are all publicised on the web. Access by children to adult material is generally restricted by credit card requirements and most programs can be configured to block access. That said, some 'net nannies' purge or restrict documents with any sexual language, but this also restricts access to educational biology documents about reproduction. AOL users complained that the restriction of the word 'breast' also removed information on breast cancer. Internet search engines often 'spider' crawl or trawl their way through web pages to ascertain content and look for keywords. This can work two ways, for instance, after Princess Diana's fatal car crash one pornographic site included the keywords 'princess Diana crash photos' to draw
people to its site, but equally one Christian pioneer included the keywords 'sex sex sex...' to draw people looking for pornography to an evangelistic site! Government investigators are also using the web to trap paedophiles, all computer use leaves a trail. Gary Glitter was arrested when he took his computer in for repair and they found illegal images still on his hard disk. The Times Magazine (22 May 1999) reported on an organisation called Cyberangels
(www.Cyberangels.org) where a 38 year old man called Nigel masquerades as a 13 year old girl called Donna in order to expose paedophiles and the web sites they use. They have a database of more than 21,000 known paedophile sites, but also over 800 volunteer workers in 20 countries tracking them down. Another danger of the Internet is the drift from 'couch potatoes' to 'mouse potatoes', the ability to find information or even now to get a 'quickie divorce' in an instant without having to leave your PC and interact with another human being.
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION
The very area of greatest danger on the Internet is also its greatest feature, free information. The lack of censorship on the Internet means that MI6 agents' identities and pornographic images are floating about in the Internet aether but so too was unbiased reporting of the Kosovo crisis. Vietnam was the world's first true media war covered by photographers, journalists and film crews, bringing home to the US war's harsh realities. Kosovo was the first Internet war with all three sides taking to the virtual air (Kosovars, Serbs and NATO). In fact, E-warfare was also introduced with the Serbs hacking into NATO's website. The online debate as to whether this was a 'Just War' was hot indeed. If we extend censorship to the web, whether sexual, political or religious, we will also lose rights to evangelise on the web, express political opinions in closed countries or indeed to have sexual health medical information online. One Christian speaker once said that the best way of avoiding temptation was to actively pursue the good instead. Hence, we should be flooding the web with Christian and educational material not complaining about what is already there. The 18th century Irish Protestant politician, Edmund Burke, said that "the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing". One Christian has done something for Internet Magazine (July 99) recently reviewed and awarded a "TOP HOME PAGE!" award to
this Christian site: www.ministry1.freeserve.co.uk
Article by Jonathan Went (BMSoftware)
JonathanWent@Teaching.telme.com
LINKS TO AUTHOR'S SITES
Biblical and multilingual software: www.bmsoftware.com
Biblical Hebrew correspondence course: www.biblicalhebrew.com
Christian study courses, resources and articles: http://members.aol.com/jwteaching
Christ for England Bible School: http://members.aol.com/cfemain
Creative Mentors: www.creativementors.com
If any of the www.sitename links don't work on older browsers try prefixing the name with http://
This article with its connecting links should be available online at: http://www.bmsoftware.com/netbenefit.htm
For other online articles see: http://www.bmsoftware.com/articles.htm