postmodernbible

Two days to go for Social Media and the Methodist Council

I've spent most of today working with a local church in Grantham exploring discipleship and holiness in the New Testament and the contemporary church.  It's bee good, really good. The church here at Harrowby Lane seem to know what they are doing and are doing it well - excellent tech kit throughout the building and wifi and so on.  Excellent technicians as well.  Sadly there are few times when I can manage to play videos as part of the teaching with sound and everything all tied together so easily.  Big thumbs up and thanks to Steve and Ian and everyone else at Harrowby Lane - and Tony and Joy for such great hospitality.

The discussion on holiness really made me rethink the idea of morals and guidelines.  It affirmed for me all over again that actually unless the heart is right, we really are going nowhere with the idea of enforcement.  All that will happen is that we will prevent those thinking about engaging with social media from engaging - it will have a precautionary force.  It's not going to stop some people blogging the most stroppy comments possible.  It's not going to stop people not paying attention during meetings.  It's not going to stop people being rude and gossipy.  All of those things relate to behaviour, to values, to lifestyle.  So to some extent it is the values issue which we should be addressing rather than the enforcement issue (of which we have lots of levels already).  It's like trying to slow down a ferrari with a road-block.  Much better to install a speed-limiter at the heart of the Ferrari at the outset?  And much less damaging.

It's interesting that Paul's letter to the Galatians argues strongly against the law and for values-based decision making.  Remember about us being set free from the law but being enslaved to Christ, about the fruit of the Spirit against which there is no law.  Anyone who chooses to follow a legalistic process will end up wrapped up and tied down by that process.  Instead, Paul says, as heirs of Christ, we are free, mature citizens who need to walk by the Spirit.  Yes, there are guidelines but not law.  The same goes through 1 Corinthians where Paul, or so I suggest to my students, sets up a series of moral questions for the Corinthians rather than laying down the law.  Is it beneficial? (1 Cor 6:12) Does it enslave? (1 Cor 6:12) Does it harm anyone? (1 Cor 8:13) Does it glorify God? (1 Cor 10:31). Both of the letters seem to set up a good ethical alternative for what needs to happen once you have decided to shed Torah observance as a norm (pace quite a few contemporary NT scholars!).

Hence the need to focus on values during Mondays debates and hence the need for appropriate Christian conferring.  David Warnock and Angela Shier-Jones have blogged on this as their latest comments on this issue - both rather averse to the sharper words of others.  

Someone has suggested somewhere that all this talk about a paper going to Council before it is actually discussed by Council is somewhat inappropriate.  Not sure how this can really be/should be the case for four reasons.  

First, it's been put into the public domain.  As a church we chose to put it on a public website.  It was not marked as confidential and so presumably as a public document it can be discussed.  Moreover, I would suggest that what has happened over the last few days has been really good - we have had opportunity to discuss the paper, to study it and review it.  We've given the paper a really good airing rather than limit ourselves to the brief 15 minute of presentation, discussion, ratification which can sometimes happen.  What is wrong with good old fashioned democracy for goodness sake?  Whyever isn't it alright to talk about things openly and honestly just as long as we maintain respect for different points of view.

Secondly, the Methodist Recorder has had a two page spread about one of the other papers - the proposal that Methodism has a president and two co-presidents (one lay and one diaconal) and that these serve for a period of three years.  (Our present system is to have one president and one vice-president both serving for one year).  Why would it be OK for an independent paper to seek to sway the minds of the Methodist people about that through the way it reports and selects what is included but not OK for another form of media to discuss another paper?  This doesn't make sense.

Thirdly, the whole point of the conversation is that the paper is seeking to bring a conversation to an end rather to open it up.  The paper is marked for decision.  But, as Dave Faulkner and others have noted, there seems to have been little attempt to have an open conversation about this paper - it comes from pretty high up within the structures of the Methodist Church rather than out of the grassroots blogging community.  In other words, this is legislation from above - and that kind of legislation often needs longer to be assimilated into all levels of the organisation - much better to have public assent that hierarchical imposition.

Fourthly, as someone who commented on my blog said the other day, there is the danger this could make us look a little silly.  In the week after the Pope urged his priests to blog (or not - read +Nick) and the British Social Attitudes Survey showed that fewer and fewer people are getting the Christian message at all (see David Keen), the Methodist Church may, unintentionally I believe, be narrowing the involvement of its staff and office holders in the world of social media.  As far as I  am concerned that cannot be.  We need a church which embraces social media, which seeks to share the Good News of the Gospel in every form, which seeks to publish the name of Jesus through Twitter, through Facebook, through MSN and Google-wave.  A church which does not place limits on the Gospel but rather sends the Gospel on its way through these means and others.  

Whatever happens on Monday, I do hope that the end result is a boost for social media within the Methodist Church and that it provides a fresh impetus for that church's engagement with an increasingly consciously irreligious Britain.

Pete

St. Aidan to Abbey Manor: Social Attitudes: the God Question (s)

David Keen has written an excellent post on the recent British Social Attitudes Survey.  Here is David's post in full - well done for such a comprehensive listing.

Note that others have had a go at this already, e.g. Church Mouse 

The recent 26th British Social Attitudes Survey has a full chapter devoted to 'Religion in Britain and the United States'. It opens "Religion is a cause of perplexity to the British. On the one hand it is associated with Christian virtue, traditional values, the Dalai Lama and all things bright and beautiful. On the other hand it brings to mind violent fanaticism, reactionary morality, Osama bin Laden, abuse and oppression. After a long history of religious turmoil and mistrust we no longer much mind (what religion our leaders are), but strong commitment makes us worried."

It's a fascinating essay, and pulls in data from the UK and USA to compare and contrast. Here are some of the questions, with a few thoughts:

1. "Do you regard yourself as belonging to any particular religion?"
(1983 figures in brackets)
No religion 43% (31)
Christian 50% (66)
Non-Christian 7 (2)

Of the 'Christian'
Anglican 23 (40)
Roman Catholic 9 (10)
No denomination 10 (3)
and other mainline denominations mostly showing a drop.

There seem to be two main stories: the falling away in identification with the historic churches, towards 'no religion' (which reflects the changing of the generations) or 'no denomination', and the impact of immigration, which has bolstered RC numbers, and seen a rise in non-Christian faiths.

2. Belief in God

I don't believe in God 18%
I don't know whether there is a God and don't believe there is any way to find out 18%
I don't believe in a personal God but I do believe in a higher power of some kind 14%
I find myself believing in God some of the time, but not at others 13%
While I have doubts, I feel that I do believe in God 18%
I know God really exists and that I have no doubts about it 17%

So about 1/3 have a definite faith, 1/3 have a fuzzier faith - either fuzzy about whether God is there, or what kind of spiritual entity God might be, and just over 1/3 are atheist or agnostic

It's useful to have this level of detail: there are surveys which report a majority as believing in God, but 'believing' and 'God' aren't straightforward categories.

3. How religious are you?
extremely/very 7%
somewhat 30%
neither religious nor non-religious 22%
somewhat non-religious 11%
very/extremely non-religious 26%

Which might in part reflect the British aversion to extremes. It's also a sign that if Christians want to communicate their faith, anything percieved as 'religious' packaging (e.g. the institutional church) is off to a losing start. 'Back to Church' Sunday will cut no mustard with people who describe themselves as non-religious.

4. How often do you attend religious services (apart from special occasions)
Never 62%
less than annually 5%
At least annually 15%
At least monthly 8%
At least weekly 10%

Less than 20% of those brought up as Anglicans, or calling themselves CofE attend monthly or more often.

This also shows that any attempt by churches to connect with non-Christians based on 'religious services' is probably a non-starter too. Weird stuff done by weird people in a weird building. This bears out some of the TEAR Fund research , which found that 26% of adults go to church once a year, and 15% go once a month or more. Jesus didn't start with religion, he started with relationships, perhaps there's something in that.

4. Does it do you any good?
there's a question on the 'personal benefits of religion'
65% agree that religion helps people to find inner peace/happiness
67% agree that it helps people to make friends
79% that it helps people to gain comfort.

Even among the 'unreligious', 49% agree with the first statement, and 58 and 68% respectively with the other two. More curious is the 10%+ of 'religious' people who don't agree with these statements!!!

5. Influence of religion
24% said religion is increasing its influence, 3/4 of these said that was a bad thing. This is the National Secular Society argument - that religion is both in decline, but becoming more politically influential.

57% said religion is decreasing its influence, and about 4 in 5 of these thought that a bad thing.

Overall, about 31% thought that more religious influence was a bad thing, and 50% that it was a good thing.

That's a big challenge: I know this lumps all religion together (it would be interesting to ask the question about particular faiths), but if Christians are seen as bad news by a significant section of our society, then a long hard look in the mirror is in order. It also begs the question of what's seen as 'religion' - is the creche provided by the Mothers Union for prison visitors, or the church-run food bank seen as an expression of religion? Or is it dusty bishops talking about sex and Islamic extremists?

6. Religion and Politics
75% said religious leaders shouldn't try to influence voting behaviour, and 67% think religious leaders should stay out of government decision making. Lords reform here we come... There's also a tendency to think that, if elected officials were more deeply religious, then laws and policy decisions would probably be worse. There's a Bush/Blair legacy to that which the report picks out.

What does this mean for the way the church engages with the General Election? I know of several churches who organise local hustings events, and encourage people to vote and engage with the issues, though it sounds like a more directive engagement (see recent RC interventions) might not go down so well. Perhaps it depends on the issue?

7. Moral Standards
89% say you should follow your conscience rather than what the leaders and teachings of your religion say. That pretty much reflects the number of people who are deeply religious.

60% agreed that there can never be absolutely clear statements of what is good and evil, or an absolute morality. That reflects where we are as a society - and a church identified with laws and rules isn't going to make much headway against that. I remember an Ethics seminar 15 years ago where we watched an hour of Eastenders and noted the dozens of moral issues raised in just a short time - processing morality through story and consensus, rather than principle and absolutes, is the flavour of things. I wonder also if this question is swayed by being part of the 'religion' section - things like racism, violence, etc. do seem to be seen in terms of moral absolutes, and nobody objects at public campaigns which try to enforce them (e.g. Kick Racism out of Football). Don't we still have some absolutes, but no longer on the turf which was colonised by Christendom?

8. Conversion
Only 17% thought it was acceptable for religious people to try to convert others, 81% took the opposite view. That raises lots of questions for mission!

About 3/4 of people think that being very religious means you're often intolerant.

9. Faith Schools
42% - no religious group should have its own schools
13% - some should have them, but not others
43% - any religious group should be able to have its own schools.

So this debate is truly alive and kicking. It's not going to go away any time soon.

There's a whole section on religious diversity and tolerance, which shows that we've still some way to go as a society. It also shows that Muslims have a serious image problem - about 1/3 felt 'cool' towards Muslims, (as opposed to neutral or warm) - far and away the least favourable result, apart from that for 'deeply religious' (29%) - most other religious groups were in the 5-15% range. A majority would be bothered by a large mosque being built locally, but relatively few by a large church. There's unease about the level to which Muslims are integrated into British society. The writers note: Muslims deserves to be the focus of policy on social cohesion, because no other group elicits so much disquiet.

Lots of food for thought here, both about perceptions and practices. Those of us percieved as being 'religious' are possibly trying to run a marathon with both legs tied together. Two responses are to abandon traditional religion, and its forms, for something more acceptable (but every movement becomes an institution in the end) or to try to make the case for religion (not a word I particularly like) being good news. That's not easy when there are plenty of examples of the opposite.

Plenty of chewing over to be done....

Dawkins digs in « Nick Baines’s Blog

I am still catching up with some of the stuff floating around the media in the last few days. The most absurd has to be the latest Richard Dawkins fundamentalist flounce about Christianity in the Times.

via nickbaines.wordpress.com

and here from George Pitcher in the Telegraph.

Some people are arguing that Pat Robertson never even said what he is accused of saying but the video and the transcript seem straightforward... He is so wrong. But I don't think it needs this kind of irrational response from Professor Dawkins 

Ruth Gledhill offers some interesting and preceptive comments linking Robertson's critique to the Haitians' own self-understanding. 

 Pete

More On Methodists And Social Media « Dave Faulkner gives some more pointers and I comment

Richard Hall interviewed Toby Scott on Wednesday. Fat Prophet sees the document as similar to standard policies issued by ’secular’ employers. Pete Phillips was consulted (as Secretary of the Faith and Order Committee) but isn’t happy. Like Pete, Matt Wardman contrasts the lengthy Methodist document with the much briefer Civil Service guidelines, which concentrate on principles and permission rather than details. Steve Jones, observing from South Africa, knows that such guidelines are normal in industry but wonders how we distinguish between legitimate debate and bringing the church into disrepute.

via bigcircumstance.com

Dave Faulkner has gone further here than I have.  

I haven't read David Hallam's blog today and since I'm running round like an idiot preparing for this weekend, I am unlikely to do so.  However there are some questions being asked which probably need to be clarified.  Here's my prophecy...

Are methodists (including ministers) going to be prevented from blogging and tweeting - ABSOLUTELY NOT!

Do methodists (including ministers) have to be careful that what they blog/tweet remains legal and in keeping with their office within the Methodist Church - ABSOLUTELY YES!

Should methodists (including ministers) keep confidential items of business confidential - ABSOLUTELY!

Should methodists (including ministers) avoid attributing information gleaned from a meeting to specific named individuals - ABSOLUTELY - Chatham Rule is going to be applied unless otherwise notified.

Beyond that, I am not sure the guidelines make many stipulations - other than no tweeting from within meetings.  So perhaps not until afterwards?  Which I think is daft!  But I'm bound to.

My problem is that the conversation is happening NOW.  Social Media is all about transparency and interactivity and sharing and openness and all those other lovely words.  Oh - and about including the people you are talking about in the conversation.  My worry is that the Church will sound defensive and outdated.  I hope it doesn't.  I know my name has been mentioned in conversations which I am not part of.  We all have that happening to us all the time.  I just wish that people would come and talk about social media to those who engage with it and research into it rather than legislating and then seeking to talk.  I'm at plenty of Methodist meetings and happy to chat!

Hats off, BTW, to Toby Scott who has always acted professionally and is willing to chat and discuss and listen to points of view from different sides of the argument.  

Do pray for us on Monday - and particularly that I would be given permission to speak in a personal capacity since I don't think this is a Faith and Order issue.

Pete

View the Pew - Carry on preaching! - Sunderland Echo - so funny!

Removed the link to the adverts - sorry about that...see below...

The Sunderland Echo has written a feature piece based on the preaching survey:
 
http://www.sunderlandecho.com/daily/Carry-on-preaching.6022270.jp 

via www.sunderlandecho.com

Pete

Matt Wardman blogs on: How well did the Civil Service Blogger Code work – 18 months on?

Back on 11 March 2008, Tom Watson, then a Parliamentary Secretary at the Cabinet Office with a special interest in Digital Media, consulted on his blog to create a set of guidelines for Civil Servants who were active online. Tom’s original post is here – note especially the conversation in the comments.

via www.mattwardman.com

Matt's been really helpful in putting some thoughts together on Social Media and pulling all this together.  

You can follow his various blogs at the following addresses:

Politics: http://www.mattwardman.com/blog/
Local Blogs: http://www.nutshell.org.uk/
Professional: http://www.mattwardman.co.uk/
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/mattwardman

Pete

Big Circumstance on the Pope's call to blog!

I picked up from Mashable the Pope’s message of three days ago encouraging and urging Catholic priests to use the digital realm and especially social media as tools for the Gospel. His whole message is here. I just thought I’d pick out one of two things I liked about Benedict’s approach:

via bigcircumstance.com

New Testament Morning...

The joys of a portfolio lifestyle in the interactive digital environment.

So my week so far:

Monday - following prayer breakfast at our house, had a desk day sorting out some Faith and Order responses, getting my lecture notes sorted and the week started, messed with finances, made last minute adjustments to programmes for Tuesday - stayed up late doing Faith and Order responses and emails cos no time for a few days otherwise - blogging on social media.

Tuesday - Big day for CODEC - spent the morning on various blogs posts and things in the office, then people started arriving for the Research Seminar so then straight over to set the room up and chair the seminar.  Before the research seminar, David Spriggs from Bible Society wants to catch up with CODEC developments and then Krish Kandiah from EAUK arrives and wants time to catch up.  Help!  So straight after the seminar we rush across Durham to Carrville and set up for the launch of Biblefresh in the NE. Excellent event - with over 100 people coming along - Bishop Tom Wright, Dave Burke, Krish Kandiah.  I do a presentation on Biblical Literacy which seemed to go fine.  Bishop Tom does a fantastically magisterial talk from a small scrap of paper on the "Bible and the Church" - how does he do it?  We're hoping to have the meeting downloadable on video sometime soon.  Meeting finishes and lots of happy people wander off into the Durham evening...Theresa has been at the meeting providing excellent admin support - so we get home at 6.15 to a house full of starving teenagers - decide on takeaway!  Loads of emails to catch up with and so by the time I get to bed my head is buzzing!

Wednesday - trip to London for Joint Implementation Commission - the body looking at how the Covenant between the Church of England and Methodism is progressing.  Three hour train each way means I can work.  Spend ages on the way down exploring social media blog post.  Why does it take so long to blog!!!  Read through the papers checking I hadn't missed anything.  Reviewed emails thanks to East Coast Mainline's free (but not very stable) wifi.  Meeting was in Westminster so headed over on the tube and had the meeting - which was fine.  Meetings are getting edgy about confidentiality and the latest gimmick is to invoke the Chatham House Rule (often called rules but wrongly so - see Chatham House website).  But that rule only talks about not attributing information to a specific person - all information can be used - it's about anonymity NOT information - and certainly not about everyone coming out singing the party line.  But..I digress.  Train home at 430pm hoping I can make it for the United match.  Spent the trip home answering more emails, (Abortion, Holy Land, Faith and Order, CODEC events), trying to watch the iPad launch (hahahaha - Twitter = iTampon!!!!!), overhearing conversations on the train (yesterday evening's post) and reading through the great tome of papers for Methodist Council next Monday/Tuesday.  Managed to get it all done and arrive in Durham for 730pm.  Home for match (Man Utd vs Man City) which was nail-bitingly intense - and such relief when we won - screamed so loud wife and dog had heart attacks!!!!  Well - not quite.

Thursday - New Testament - teaching John's Gospel - here's my handout for this morning's lecture on Symbolism, Irony and Word Games (Download TM202 (2,3) handout).  Sent out a couple of papers for people to read beforehand - I hope they have.  Then I am going to prepare for Grantham where I am spending the weekend with Harrowby Lane Methodist Church exploring "The Bible, Mission and Discipleship" or something like that.  And then having a conversation with one of the senior leaders of the Methodist Church about the papers for Council next week - are there any Faith and Order issues which are likely to come up - my initial response is likely to run along the lines: "Is the Pope a Catholic?"

This is quite representative of my life at the moment.  After Grantham on Saturday and Sunday, I come home to Durham Sunday evening only to travel to High Leigh for two days for Methodist Council and then onto London for a meeting with the fantastic people from KORE on Tuesday afternoon and then meetings at Methodist Church House on Wednesday, then back to Durham lecturing on Thursday to bounce back to London on Friday for more meetings at Methodist Church House.  

Theresa and the kids, of course, my prime responsibility as a Christian husband and father, don't get much of look in there, do they?

I don't think that this portfolio life is much different from the accounts which many people could give, especially those involved in digital media and Christian education.  When we had the Digital Symposium here last July, the story was the same from so many people.  I seem to know a lot of people who put together list of bits and pieces to make one full time job - or rather one allegedly full time job when full = 60-70 hours a week!  

I long to be a New Testament lecturer sat in my study day to day immersing myself in John - I love John's Gospel so much.  I could do that very very well and write research papers and books and have such a good time and clock off at 5pm and go home and spend time with my wife and kids, pour time into the local church and have hobbies.  But I also love being involved in Biblefresh and CODEC and the View from the Pew stuff and social media and mission and, to tell the truth, I quite enjoy the Faith and Order stuff too.  But having one job with one set of responsibilities seems a better option, certainly for me and for my family.  But isn't that still grass on the other side of the fence?  Isn't it about priorities whatever we are doing?  Certainly, I think the kind of job I have fitting so many facets together into one package, one portfolio, is actually a sign of the times - a reality for an increasing number of people.

Anyway, must open a new folder...

Pete

Ipad

I was on the way home from a meeting in London when the iPad was being released.  It was funny to hear a table of PC geeks laughing and joking and then they read about the ten hours battery life and whispered it amongst themselves - 'no not ten hours, how have they done that?'.  A hushed awe descended, as they looked at the pictures and coo-ed over the technology.  Eventually they recovered and returned to derision.  'Ah, it's just a big iPhone', 'Yeah', 'Course it is...'

There seems to be a general feeling that that's all the iPhone is. On Twitter someone asked "What's it going to do that my macbook/netbook/iphone can't do?"  Although during their cooing stage, the guys on the train asked one another, 'What is it - a phone, a laptop, what?'  The reply came:'None of those, this is something completely different.' Someone else sent me the comment: And another thing: people are fussing about the difference between this an a laptop, but have missed one important distinction. My windows laptop takes nearly five full minutes to switch on. My iPhone takes only seconds, even from a full off. The speed with which the iPad is just ready for you will be a big selling point compared with laptops. We'll have to wait and see whether it something different.

...and if anyone wants to sponsor CODEC to help us buy one, we can tell you what we think.

Again, it was from Twitter that I think I saw the best immediate question/slogan: iPad vs Laptop = interaction vs creation.  This comes from the demonstrations which the Apple people were doing with the iPad, I think.  It was about reading a paper, playing a game, watching a presentation, playing itunes and dvds, and using apps. Is the iPad a play toy - a consumer gadget for consuming yet more gadgetry with lots of pay per view stuff on it from the rather threatened print industries?  If so, then it becomes a pipe for consumer pleasure rather than a tool for creativity.  Will the iPad offer opportunities to do more things or simply to spend more money?

With Apple's shares falling on Nasdaq after the demonstration, the jury is out, Mr Jobs!

Pete

p.s. Two final comments from Twitter after football match (which my team one!):

1. With a picture of an Etch-a-Sketch - "Sir, my iPad is broken!'

2. I don't understand this one..."Pondering whether to go for the light flow iPad (16gig wifi), or wait for the super absorbent one with wings (64gig 3G)."  You get wings??? 

Social Media and the Methodist Council

Over the last few days, I have mentioned a paper which the Methodist Church is putting before its Council next Monday and Tuesday.  The paper sets out some guidelines for the use of social media and also contains a paper explaining the rationale.  You can download the paper yourself from the Methodist Church website.

Some of the Methodist bloggers have been talking about the paper - Richard Hall thinks its a sensible move forward and points to some internal discussion elsewhere - a conversation which dates back to the beginning of 2008; David Hallam, ever the controversialist, talks of fatwas being issued against Methodist bloggers and is dismayed at the lack of understanding of social media; David Faulkner kind of sits in the middle of both although wants to raise questions about the origin of the report (within non-executive, very senior meetings - Senior Leadership Team and Connexional Leadership Forum - hotbeds of social networking, I suppose? sorry, that was unnecessary ) and the process by which it came to be. Angela Shier-Jones hasn't entered the fray yet, but, I understand, is increasingly anxious about the issue (come on, Angela!) and nor has David Perry, winner of last year's Best Christian Blog award.  Dave Warnock is clearly too busy to blog on this at the moment and John Cooper's been focussing on things musical! 

There are of course other guidelines about blogging and other churches exploring social media.  There are even Christian ones issued by the Evangelical Alliance - the ten commandments of blogging!  Interestingly the United Methodist Church, the US version of Methodism, has recently launch a fantastic Web 2.0 based site thousand doors which plays with and exploits social media moving beyond facebook and twitter in what is a truly remarkable way!  Go UMC!  Seems a lot less concerned and ready to go for it than we do at times.

The paper has been through a bit of a peer review in that some Methodist bloggers have been asked to look at it.  It would be improper to out them although there is some consternation among the blogs that this has not been an open process.  Bloggers love transparency and love to be involved in developing their own guidelines - hence the discussion at the Methodist Bloggers meeting last year (shame I couldn't get there/didn't know about it?).  Note, for example, how the government developed its own guidelines for Civil Servant bloggers following the Civil Serf controversy.  Tom Watson MP, the minister responsible began a blog conversation and received hundreds of comments back.  You can still find the conversation online. The key thing here is that the minister involved the bloggers from the start - a point made absolutely clear in Matt Wardman's discussion of the process.  This is contextual guideline making (like contextual theology which the church seems to love so much - 'do your theology from the ground up', we are told all the time), rather than attempting to impose something from on high onto a system you don't really understand.  If the mandarins had imposed the guidelines the civil service bloggers, obviously an edgy lot, would have been resistant.  But here those on high (named as sources in the report) are imposing guidelines on  group which seems unaware that this is coming.  

Back to the Civil Service, the resulting guidelines amount to just 79 words:

1. Be credible: Be accurate, fair, thorough and transparent.
2. Be consistent: Encourage constructive criticism and deliberation. Be cordial, honest and professional at all times.
3. Be responsive: When you gain insight, share it where appropriate.
4. Be integrated: Wherever possible, align online participation with other offline communications.
5. Be a civil servant: Remember that you are an ambassador for your organisation. Wherever possible, disclose your position as a representative of your department or agency.

I do have to say that this is much much better than the 28 page paper which is going before the Council (sorry, Toby, but you know how I feel!).  Why?  Well, it understands what social media is all about and doesn't attempt to block it.  It realises that this is the technology of both the present and the future.  It is the technology which lots of people out there are using all the time.  It's allowing for breathing space for bloggers rather than clamping down on them.  It is open and transparent and trusts.

One of the guidelines suggests that you won't be able to tweet or message from within Methodist meetings, certainly not before the official tweets have been sent.  How daft!  So, people in the public gallery can tweet but people on the floor can't because it means they won't be paying attention.  Haven't we heard of multitasking?  Read the OxIS Report on Internet Britain - what is it, 70% of people multitask when using computers?  Just because I tweet it does not mean I am not paying attention.  Indeed, the latest discussions on micro-noting suggest that people listen more intently so that they have something to tweet about!  And is it really any different from those doing their emails, playing sudoku or planning tomorrow's funeral address?  And the idea that the official line needs to get out first is just so precious for the age of the internet.  And then there is the whole misunderstanding of the gap between public and private in social media - what gap?  How about a turning inside out, of a reversal of our anthropology?  Of things being talked about in social media which are internalised in previous public discourse and vice versa?  Of the public parade of internal conversation on blogs and facebook and twitter.  That's the point!  Well, one of them.

For those of us involved in social media, and I am a bit in my role in CODEC, then its about 24/7 connectivity, about making links, about sharing information, about enabling conversations.  I am not so sure the guidelines being offered won't shut that conversation down.  There is nothing in the paper (well, a brief paragraph) about the benefits of social networking for liberation and for the inclusion of more and more and more people.  We need to be embracing the technology, throw off the shackles of censorship and let the tweets fly!  The biggest flaw in the paper is that it doesn't proclaim this or embrace social media wholeheartedly or even make much of its strengths.  The paragraph on the strengths is so weak (and I did offer to re-write it!) whereas the following list of risks and problems highlights where this paper is coming from - conservative wariness rather than prophetic zeal.  Bring on the prophets, Council!

Not quite that easy, is it?  As I said the other day, social networking has to be responsible.  But I think it can be self regulating and needs a much lighter touch which is developed within the social media itself rather than imposed as a series of guidelines.  Indeed, the guidelines suggested are more than guidelines because repeated flouting of them will result in disciplinary action possibly leading to dismissal. 

Why do I think self regulation and a lighter touch is in order here?  

Our actions are governed by the values we hold. Methodists, ordained and lay, already hold values which promote inclusivity, social holiness, a regard for the other, a passion for Christian discipleship.  These values are regulated by our worship life, by membership, by liturgical acts like the Covenant Service, by the Deed of Union and, for the ordained, by a pledge to keep our doctrines and discipline.  In fact our values are pretty heavily legislated upon within the Methodist Church - as befits our heritage within the Wesleyan Holiness movements. 

These values can then direct the policy and we know that the best policy is created within the community to which it applies.  Imposition from outside, from a governance body which might not really have a grasp of the issues, cannot work and can only lead to feelings of rebellion and outrage - especially in the world of social networking.  We have the values in place.  Those values could be developed/crystallized in something like the Civil Service Bloggers Code which then provides proper guidelines (not rules) which could be managed through Methodism's already existing line management and supervisory systems.

And I am not suggesting a free for all.  The good bits of the paper, and the good bits of the Civil Service Code, point out the responsibility of blogging and using social media.  Confidentiality is a requirement.  Libel and slander and defamation and harassment - see yesterday's postings - are a reality within the world of blogging.  But if people are blogging or tweeting like this, then its likely they are emailing like this and talking like this - in other words the issue is not social media but values.  Jesus had it dead right: it's not what goes into someone's mouth that defiles them but what comes out (Matthew 15:11).  If the values are not right, then however much we legislate, all we will do is create more sinners!

Finally, I would suggest that Methodism needs to embrace social networking far far far more.  It shouldn't be impeding social networking at all.  It was Wesley's passion for embracing the technology of the day (public preaching, social holiness, small group meetings, hymns written to 'pub' tunes, wacky medicine) which pushed him out into the public arena.  

How good would it be for the Methodist Council to push aside these guidelines and embrace social media's own way of doing things and of regulating itself based upon the very values which are already within the DNA of Methodism - and trust the policing to our already burgeoning disciplinary processes...

Pete