This interview with David Weinberger on CIO caused me to go back and read that chapter again in The Cluetrain Manifesto
the cluetrain manifesto – chapter five

Conversation that understands that it isn’t a distraction from work, it IS the real work of business.

This again is a key concept for Churches to understand, as well as businesses. The act of conversing about those things on which we are most deeply concerned (and on OTHER things by which we are also “energized”) IS itself the mission of the Church– or a neccessary prerequisite to actually having the energy, the shared knowledge and affirmation of a community behind you, and the collaborative power of a CALLING to get something done.

If this were the case in Churches, there would be no problem with having a group of people who have felt CALLED to enable a support movement and voter-registration drive to get Bush out of office. If one views the role of the Church to “not offend” people, then they may as well close the doors. There would be a conversation-encouraging Web component that would do somethign along the order of what the Dem blogs have been doing, and more specifically, what theological issues are at stake; what “prophetic voice” of dissent and debate need to be voiced. Media study; holding media accountable, is also an important issue to a democracy that assumes that people know WHAT they are voting for, and not the bumper sticker slogans and “un-nuanced” proclamations along the “party line”.