CyberReligion

When it comes to technology, I've always thought the Church lags behind . However, when I came across this post - Top 10 Church and Religious Web Sites - from TutorialBlog.org, I was surprised at the innovative designs (I know this is more 'religion online' rather than my usual 'online religion', but I thought I should branch out a little bit).

Although my knowledge of html and css is limited (designed my Dad's company web site when I was 13, that's about it), these sites are impressive. I think my favourites have to be Generation Church and Revolution Church.

It really shows how the Church is willing to spend good money (I doubt members of the clergy are designing these sites themselves!) hiring developers to build flashy web sites in order to attract a younger generation.

Within the comments on the blog post there is some debate as to whether churches should have a flashy web site. Some say that is is a waste of money and that a simpler, more text-based web site would be more appropriate. A flashy web site just means that the Church is trying too hard to look 'cool'. However, others say that money should never be an issue when trying to get the message of the Church across, and relatively speaking, the cost of designing and running a web site is not too dear.

Personally, I like it when the Church embraces new technologies. However, it would be interesting to see the effectiveness of the sites i.e. how many people started attending a particular church because of their web site? Or perhaps that's not the main goal of these sites. Since many offer discussion boards, the sites's purposes may be for current church-goers to have an online 'water-cooler' (as one comment put it).

Whatever the main reason for churches having their own web site, they definitely attract the attention of geeky web designers!