PBS Article on Evangelism and Social Media

Last night, PBS published an article entitled Religious Evangelists Spread Faith through Social Media.

What I like about the article is it shows how sharing your faith through social networks addresses many of the misconceptions and horror stories of evangelism.

Many people (both Christians and non-Christians) when they think of evangelism think of a street corner preacher or the tactless co-worker who acts self-righteous and is always telling people they’re going to hell.  A lot of bad evangelism has led to this misconception that evangelism is trying to push your beliefs onto people who are just not interested.

What John Saddington of ChurchCrunch, who as interviewed for the article points out is “One of the nice things about social media is that it establishes a two-way conversation… Instead of blaring our faith into people’s faces, we can use blogs and social media to dialogue.”

It’s that natural, relational aspect of social networking that I love.  It allows me to live my faith in a way that is more open to my friends.  They can see I have good days and bad days and how I respond to each.  I think it allows people to see that as a Christian I am a regular guy, but my relationships with Jesus shapes everything I do in a positive way.

Social networks also allow me to encourage people, joke with people, share opinions, articles, or videos.  It gives me lots more points of contact than I have offline.  And those points of contact can often serve as conversation starters for when I do see them off line.

Lots of other good stuff in the article, so check it out.

What do you think of the article?  What do you think of the opportunities to share your faith through social networking relationships?