Chris Brogan had a post this week talking about what he sees coming (and already happening)  in Social Media.  “Foldups”;  joining forces.  Pooling skills. 

If I’m right (so far so good), I would recommend looking for who you could team up with to build a better social business. I’d look for the skills you lack, the capabilities you could stand to add, and find a team that will let you see 2010 through by having more capabilities and capacity than the other guys. There are lots of other folks who might be ready for the collaboration. One of you simply has to ask.

chrisbrogan.com — Learn How Human Business Works – Beyond Social Media

Seems the church needs to heed this.  One area where they have glaring need is in the “theological” study of social media as a channel.  What’s happening in it?  What are the areas of opportunity?  What are the areas where we need to stand firm and defend a robust ecclesiology (our definition of and practice of church). 

I see a glaring gap between the luddites (ie. all technology is to be shunned)  and the techno-topians  (ie all this is good and should be adopted whole heartedly).

We have to be more discerning than that.  Jesse Rice’s book ,  The Church of Facebook ,  while certainly not an anti-Facebook rant,  does have a warning about “hyperconnectivity”.  The church must not (IMHO)  succumb to the idea that “online worship” contains all that worship needs to be , in fact,  worship.  Of course,  often it is the case that “traditional” worship doesn’t even contain all of that either.  We can explore the elements of worship as experienced via the ether and mediated by online tools,  but we must pay close attention to what worship is as we build portals and tools where new modes of mixing communication types are combined,  and invite new ways to interact. 

The collaboration we need here is between technology and theology.  The way of the world is not always the pattern that serves us best.  (Understatement).   Let’s be real careful here.  This is the glaring omission I see happening.  There is a theological moderation (moderation as in monitoring of interaction in both content – but not censoring–  and style)  that needs to be present.  We are a theological body.  We have a call to a communication style that is unique and distinct.  And this is part of being a distinct body.  We need developers.  We need theologians.  And we need bridges between the two.  This is the gap to which I feel called.