Become a fan of the Episcopal Church on Facebook
Episcopal News Service. August 12, 2009 [081209-02]
Lynette Wilson
Madison Avenue has long known that word of mouth is the best advertising – a truth regularly played out on Facebook, the popular online social networking site.
Brandon Mozingo, 32, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, became a fan of the Episcopal Church on Facebook after noticing a friend became a fan. The same with Ann Redmond, 54, of Tallahassee, Florida, a member of St. John's Episcopal Church and a singer in the choir.
As of August 12 the 2.2 million-member Episcopal Church had 6,950 Facebook fans, and another 841 people follow the Episcopal Church on Twitter, the social network/micro-blogging online instant messenger.
The Episcopal Church created a Facebook presence in early 2009 and began sending "tweets" via Twitter in April. Initially the Facebook page saw a huge spike in fans, but adding new fans now trends toward gradual growth. Tweets from the recent 76th General Convention in July in Anaheim, California, spiked the number of followers on Twitter, said web producer Barry Merer.
(The Office of Communication's Media Hub website, with links to Facebook and Twitter, and Episcopal Life Online carried comprehensive online coverage of General Convention.)
Elizabeth Apgar Triano, 45, of Patterson, New York, became a fan through Episcopal Café, an online source of aggregated Episcopal news, blogs, visual arts and spiritual readings produced by the Diocese of Washington.
"One of the reasons I signed up for Facebook in the first place was to keep track of Episcopal things," she said in a telephone interview. "I like it because when something gets posted it is sent straight to me, I don't have to go over and check. I love my church and it's very handy."
It works like this: top stories posted to Episcopal Life Online and news posted to the Office of Communication's News Line are fed automatically to the church's Facebook page by Real Simple Syndication, or RSS. The article's headline appears on the main page. Clicking on the headline takes you to a "note." The full article can be viewed by clicking on the "View Original Post" link on the note page. Fans of the page can also share links, news stories, photos, videos, etc. (News stories posted to Twitter link directly to the story.)
Merer administers the site, which so far has policed itself, with fans respecting the open, unedited dialogue approach, he said.
Rex Tomb, 59, of Arlington, Virginia, posts stories to the Episcopal Church's Facebook page to draw attention to the suffering and persecution of Christians worldwide.
"It [Facebook] provides tremendous freedom," Tomb said, adding that he sticks to posting stories from credible news sources like the Washington Post, the Christian Science Monitor, and United Press International (UPI).
Redmond said Facebook is a good way to "get better in touch with the lay community," and likened it to the old days when "people went to the town square to pass information around."
In a church as widespread as the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion, it's nice to hear peoples' voices in an open, insightful dialogue from other dioceses, said Mozingo, who is also pursuing the priesthood in the Episcopal Diocese of East Tennessee.
A drawback, however, Mozingo said, is that people don't always read the articles they post comments on.
An article in which the Episcopal Public Policy Network requested that Episcopalians support healthcare reform drew a record number of responses: 95 people "liked" the story and 89 people posted individual responses ranging from "The Episcopal Church should try spreading the Gospels and should stay out of politics," to "Every tax-paying American should have affordable health care coverage."
Ginger Mortimer O'Connell, 60, of West Virginia, said she follows the Episcopal Church on Facebook because: "I think it is the most convenient way to be daily reminded that the church is a living organism in transition."