Regarding my post a couple entries back wondering whether I am moving at all toward my goals for the future, it seems to be that this is the nature of call. It requires some faith. To the secular mind, it has to do with finding what it is that “captures” you to the extent that you want to spend your life on it. It’s like marriage. If I believe in the end, then I’m always on a journey that requires steps. It rarely seems to move fast enough, and the path is not often well lit. But I’ll get there. I’ve been 5 years where I am in terms of a “day job”, and sometimes it makes use of what really interests me. I have learned many technical things which I can use, and have. So much more could be done, though, with what I have. Online Community is not just a good strategy for Webs in the religious community , it is what I consider to be “required research” and sorely needed to humanize the Web spectrum, and to be a witness to the humanity and love of the theological community. The theological community has a task of providing a place of refuge and a place of mobilization to outreach, in the context of the online culture. Many books have been written and more are yet to come about the way online communications will change religious experience, and the way it plays out in face to face communities. Having said that, I further submit to you that it is a duty to the “builders” of online places that we not forsake the human element, and realize that our audience is not just a bunch of eyeballs and walllets to attract, but that they will be more attracted to our places if we provide a way for them to share experience, review the resources we offer from their own experience, and aggregate the right kind of resources for them base don who they are, what they seek, and be a little presumptious and try to also provide “what they need”. Just as pastors and churches and lay leaders need to be cognizant of “markets” as that relates to Church people and what attracts them, they also realizze that there are things that they NEED that goes beyond what activities they attend. They have a need to be known, and they often need us to help them get into the context of caring and committed commuinity that is built around finding their calling ; so that they can be supported in their quest to discover ways to fulfill that call. Online Theological Education is ripe with possibilities for the Church. Theological Education is, for me, a much larger picture than Seminaries. It includes any “learnings” we expect to gain in Theological Community, like just “plain old Christian Education”; in a larger sense: what knowledge we need to help us live fully in community, be the Church in the world, and live our part in that story. Churches and any other Theological Communities need to be “mini-seminaries”. A major piece of “Seminary Culture” is the atmosphere of dialogue ; between students, students and teachers, students and their “charge”. Online, we have a new kind of place that makes possible new ways of connecting people, exchanging ideas, and keeping the conversation going.