e-Battling Demons and Other Woes

[Jesus] made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen, and spilled the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said, 'Take these out of here, and stop making my Father's house a marketplace.'

' John 2:13

No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon.

' Matthew 6:24

When the same entertainment network that gave us Family Guy and American Idol (and soon, The Wall Street Journal) does a multi-million dollar buyout of a self-proclaimed 'spiritual Web site,' www.beliefnet.com, no one can deny that the selling of religion online has become big business.

Although the Bible and the Pope may have both condemned mixing commerce and worship (see, www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2007-12-09-pope_N.htm), today the temple referred to in the passage from the Gospel of St. John quoted above appears to have firmly established itself in digital form in the e-commerce marketplace, rather than the marketplace having been set up ' and pitched out of ' the temple.

In December, on the eve of one of the Christian world's holiest celebrations, media mogul Rupert Murdoch's Fox Entertainment Group paid 'tens of millions of dollars,' according to The Wall Street Journal, in its widely reported acquisition of Beliefnet. Beliefnet claims to be the 'largest spiritual Web site ' independent and not affiliated with any spiritual organization or movement, (whose) only agenda is to help you meet your spiritual needs' (see, www.beliefnet.com/about/index.asp, and www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/05/AR2007120500912.html).

Through the Ethernet
To the Great Beyond

Beliefnet is just one of a multitude of virtual spirituality sites working to save actual souls, but carrying out its mission online. For example, the indisputably mainstream Church of England has begun to use the social-networking site Facebook (www.facebook.com) to distribute information through animated Christmas cards 'specially designed' for Facebook users during the Advent season to allow the recipients to find information about their local churches (see, www.cofe.anglican.org/news/pr11407.html). In the words of the Rt. Rev. Pete Broadbent, the Anglican Bishop of Willesden: 'I think this is a brilliant idea. Like a number of my clergy and hundreds of their parishioners, I've got a page on Facebook. It's a quick and easy way for people to stay in touch and the Church needs to use Web sites like this to reach out to as many people as possible.'

In Judaism, which has no central authority governing all aspects of the faith's various denominations, leaders and lay people are using the Internet to inform and aid Jews and to offer information about Judaism to Christians interested in the religion, but not to proselytize, which Judaism frowns on (see, www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/335578/jewish/The-Soul-of-Cyberspace.htm). In a discussion of how technology could promote Judaism's goals for humanity, a noted rabbi (citing the work of a now-deceased but revered leader, who was commenting on the benefits of radio and television in that man's time) even humorously compared the TCP/IP protocol to God, in the power of both to unify people: 'The advance of scientific understanding is increasingly revealing the inherent unity in the universe, as expressed in the forces of nature,' the revered leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch Orthodox Jewish community once said.

Rabbi Yosef Y. Kazen, director of the group's Web sites, is quoted in an article on the Chabad site (see reference above) as more recently saying of the extension of the leader's teaching: 'Because if there's an effect between myself and a person who's in Beijing, or myself and a person in Antarctica, and it's an instant communication, what is the lesson showing us? ' My question is, in a humorous fashion, is TCP/IP [the dominant Internet communications protocol] another name for God? Because in essence, this is a way that you're finding a unity between people.'

e-Ecumenical 'e-Commerce'

Simple online searching or browsing portal sites such as Beliefnet.com will quickly reveal many other faiths' online preaching, net-casting, and information-promulgation. For example, see, www.vatican.va/index.htm, http://www.cofe.anglican.org or www.chabad.org/?gclid=CPT5r8b9m5ACFSSaZQodo2jV7g (one of the many sites offering information on Judaism).

But Mammon, a word that was applied as a name in ancient times and at least through the Middle Ages to a demon and also to riches (sometimes with a connection between riches and iniquity), apparently knows what it is doing when it comes to using e-commerce technology to save souls: The numbers back up Beliefnet's claim to be the largest spiritual Web site. According to recent data from comScore Inc. (see, www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1808), Beliefnet led the pack in the rapidly growing field of religious sites, advancing 13% against the sector's 5% overall growth rate. In fact, after the sale, Beliefnet's founder was quoted in The Financial Times highlighting the pecuniary benefits of the site to its advertisers ' in addition to the spiritual advantages.

'Mr Waldman declined to disclose its financial performance but said Beliefnet's audience had proved particularly appealing to entertainment and pharmaceutical companies. 'In the last few years, national advertisers have awakened in a big way to the need to reach people of faith and spirituality”(see, www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c94daa66-a2c0-11dc-81c4-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1).

Although Beliefnet's founder also claimed, 'We created Beliefnet primarily to make a difference, not a killing,' the sale was immediately perceived by the business press as helping Fox to 'gain a promotional outpost for its religious books and programming businesses ' and to promote religious and spiritual content such as films from Fox Faith as well as books from News Corp.'s HarperCollins book-publishing arm' (see, http://online.wsj.com/article_print/SB119682036169113909.html).

Indeed, Beliefnet uses the latest online marketing techniques, such as its recently formed social networking site Beliefnet Community (still in
beta testing, at http://community.beliefnet.com/index.php?page_id=1000&site_page_id=1). And even through Beliefnet's co-founder's letter about the sale proclaimed the 'high quality spiritual content' that Fox and News Corp. could bring to Beliefnet, he also trumpeted benefits closer to the wallet of the advertiser than to the heart of the preacher.

'This is a thrilling moment for us. As you know, News Corp and Fox own media powerhouses such as Twentieth Century Fox, MySpace, The Wall Street Journal and Fox Network. ' News Corp's reach is enormous. Its proficiency in the areas of video, social networking and media in general is unsurpassed. ' Fox Entertainment Group's goal is to leverage these characteristics across a broader media canvas and provide programming, production, advertising sales, technology and marketing expertise that will enhance a terrific product.'

Miracles, Money, Marketing:
Making the Most of the Net

But the success ' and sale ' of Beliefnet was not a miracle. As have the purveyors of any other product, adherents of religion and spirituality have turned online to sell those beliefs to the masses ' as they have with any other form of e-commerce. As a report from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business noted: 'Reaching non-believers ' known as 'seekers' or the 'un-churched' in evangelical-speak ' is a primary mission of megachurches' (referring to use of general advertising methods for proselytization, rather than online tools specifically). (See, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1605&CFID=36369670&CFTOKEN=47361606&jsessionid=9a30579d90fc2927c272.) As Cornell University Professor R. Laurence Moore was quoted as saying in the same Wharton report: 'Religious organizations actively seeking to grow and expand ' raise money, reach new members ' do things that are as much secular as religious.'

But such efforts have had unanticipated consequences. For example, USA Today recently reported on an explosion in faith-oriented blogs ' and, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, on how they face the same challenges with argumentative believers as their secular real-world counterparts, in 'Bloggers keep the faith, contentiously' (see, www.usatoday.com/tech/webguide/internetlife/2007-11-26-faith-bloggers_N.htm?csp=tech). One spiritual leader who has 'soured on the blogs' incendiary approach' to issues of church governance and religious expressions, even 'fretted ' that battling bloggers frighten off 'lost souls and new believers. ' Lost people are seeing the deep division and sometimes hatred that is flowing forth among churches and among those who are involved in convention discussions. For Christ's sake, stop!” One pastor of a church that has aggressively adopted commercial tactics in its outreach even said, 'At the end of the day, we don't want the church to become a prostitute of business' (see, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1605&CFID=36369670&CFTOKEN=47361606&jsessionid=9a30579d90fc2927c272).

More sedately, a group of Catholic nuns, even though cloistered to separate themselves from the world, received the National Catholic Leadership Award for their Web cam exposition of the Communion Host (see, www.philly.com/philly/news/local/11104577.html). The Pink Sisters won for their 'cutting-edge' ways and their 'insightful use of technology.' Through their Web site, the sisters pray to achieve their 'mission ' of increasing awareness and devotion to our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament. We also seek to bring the live image of His living Presence to the homebound, the workplace, and to remote areas around the world' (see, www.savior.org). The leader of the organization giving the award highlighted this combination of traditional spirituality and today's technologies this way: 'We thought it was really remarkable that these sisters, living a cloistered life most people associate with the Middle Ages, are utilizing the means and methods of today to evangelize.'

Even such bastions of marketplace mores as the Wharton School and Business Week magazine could not ignore how the intersection of online commerce and religion has become big business, by devoting issues to the economic aspects of religion as practiced today. For example, the November edition of Wharton's online newsletter, Knowledge@ Wharton, included a series of studies on projects designed to 'mov(e) development-minded pastors from good intentions to executive ability' (see, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1840#). Also, Business Week's May 23, 2005, cover story, 'Earthly Empires,' chronicled how certain congregations 'eager(ly) embrace ' corporate-style growth strategies (to win) ' a tremendous advantage in the battle for religious market share' (see, www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_21/b3934001_mz001.htm).

Moreover, the prestigious Pew Foundation's Internet and American Life Project has issued two reports on the use of the Internet for spiritual purposes. In 2004, it determined that 64% of American Internet users had gone online for 'faith related matters,' including:

• e-Mail with spiritual content;
• Greeting cards related to religious holidays;
• News accounts of religious events;
• Information on religious celebrations;
• Information on where to attend religious services;
• Online prayer requests; and, of course
• Making online donations (see, www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/126/report_display.asp).

An earlier report from the dawn of the populist online era in 2000, 'Wired churches, wired temples: Taking congregations and missions into cyberspace' (see, www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/28/report_display.asp), had already concluded that 'the Internet has become a vital force in many faith communities. Most of the respondents are eager to use their Web sites to increase their presence and visibility in their local communities and explain their beliefs.'

An In-Synch
Institution and Business

Yet, are today's religious groups that use e-commerce to promote their beliefs any different from their predecessors who used the latest technologies of their time to spread their message? For example, the ages-old oral traditions of Judaism were preserved for later generations through the innovation of one of the earliest mass-communication technologies ' written-word scrolls. The growth of Christianity, particularly in the Roman world outside what is now the Middle East, depended on the availability of the Roman road and postal service to circulate the early saints' epistles, particularly to the distant Gentiles. Medieval construction advances made lofty cathedrals possible, whose statues and stained glass windows provided a regular exposure to religious education to the rich and the illiterate alike. In 1452, the Gutenberg Bible became the first book printed on movable type, heralding the start of the Renaissance, and beginning an era when 'most of the earliest books dealt with religious subjects' (see, www.historyguide.org/intellect/press.html). In other words, today's venerable, tradition-bound churches were once the early adopters of technology. Modern emerging spiritual movements, particularly those of Christian evangelicals and fundamentalists, are using e-commerce techniques in exactly the same way, and for the same purpose, as cutting-edge marketers are.

Evangelical Protestant minister Rick Warren commented similarly on the historical roots underlying his use of online evangelization in a Business Week series. 'Every time the Bible is made available through a new technology, there tends to be an awakening,' Warren says. 'The Protestant Reformation occurred after the invention of the printing press. And now we have the Internet. So now I can talk to pastors all around the world. I have a newsletter ' Ministry Toolbox ' that I e-mail to 140,000 pastors every week. That kind of networking promotes growth, but it was not possible 10 years ago' (see, www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_21/b3934015_mz001.htm).

It wasn't long after the dot-com boom of the 1990s that progressive churchmen saw this opportunity. As Pope Benedict's predecessor, John Paul II, noted in his 2001 'Message for World Communications Day': '[T]he Internet (can) carry religious information and teaching beyond all barriers and frontiers. Such a wide audience would have been beyond the wildest imaginings of those who preached the Gospel before us' (see, www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/messages/communications/documents/hf_jp-ii_mes_20010124_world-communications-day_en.html). Even earlier, John Paul II had exhorted his faithful to use new technologies, in his discussion of 'the Christian message in a computer culture,' in his 1990 'World Communications Day Message,' before most techies realized the potential of the Internet outside academia (see, www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/messages/communications/documents/hf_jp-ii_mes_24011990_world-communications-day_en.html):

'With the advent of computer telecommunications and what are known as computer participation systems, the Church is offered further means for fulfilling her mission. Methods of facilitating communication and dialogue among her own members can strengthen the bonds of unity between them. Immediate access to information makes it possible for her to deepen her dialogue with the contemporary world. In the new 'computer culture' the Church can more readily inform the world of her beliefs and explain the reasons for her stance on any given issue or event. She can hear more clearly the voice of public opinion, and enter into a continuous discussion with the world around her, thus involving herself more immediately in the common search for solutions to humanity's many pressing problems. It is clear that the Church must also avail herself of the new resources provided by human exploration in computer and satellite technology for her ever pressing task of evangelization' (see, www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/messages/communications/documents/hf_jp-ii_mes_24011990_world-communications-day_en.html).

That Other 'Higher Authority':
The Law

In one way, at least, online spiritual sites must bow before Mammon: When it comes to the law. The Terms of Service or copyright notice and in some cases, confidentiality disclaimers, that are eternally present on commercial Web sites, appear on many sites devoted to spiritual and religious matters, to guard the owners and others against litigation filed by the unsatisfied, or maybe overzealous or non-religious. On the other hand, perhaps it's not surprising, in context, that some religion sites are so far out-of-market and more concerned with matters of the mind than the marketplace, per se, that they feature no Terms of Use, or other warning or disclosure pages. For these sites, counsel would do well to advise clients who have attorneys to protect themselves by drafting and posting such information. But on the big portals, particularly on commercial sites, the typical Web site boilerplate appears. For example, at www.beliefnet.com/about/terms.asp, Beliefnet.org provides it, but with a reverent genuflection to its loftier purposes. After relatively standard disclosures about content, contests, third-party advertising, and other purely secular concerns, a unique disclaimer appears about 'professional advice':

Disclaimer regarding Professional Advice. Your use of the Site is at your own risk. The relationship between you and Beliefnet is not a physician-patient relationship or a psychotherapist-patient relationship or a priest-penitent relationship. The Beliefnet Content contains information, data, advice, text and other materials compiled from a variety of third party sources. Beliefnet in no way endorses any of these materials, which are provided for your convenience, and are solely intended to broaden user understanding and knowledge of religious and spiritual topics.

Nothing contained in the Site is intended to be, and must not be taken to be, the practice of medicine, including, without limitation, psychology, psychiatry, or psychotherapy, or providing health care advice or instruction for diagnosis or treatment. Beliefnet does not recommend the self-management of health or mental health problems, and the Beliefnet Content is not exhaustive and does not cover all diseases, ailments, physical or mental conditions or their treatments. You should never disregard medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on the Site. (Emphasis added.)

Although most of these paragraphs could be found at any medical or self-help Web site, apparently those seeking help from above need higher warnings. Even the online perpetual-adoration site www.savior.org discloses warnings about pop-up windows, browser optimization and frames. The Jewish outreach site www.chabad.org similarly encourages sharing its message, provided that its copyrights are respected:

The content on this page is copyrighted by the author, publisher and/or Chabad.org, and is produced by Chabad.org. If you enjoyed this article, we encourage you to distribute it further, provided that you comply with the copyright policy. (See, www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/36220/jewish/Our-Tools.)

Similarly, the Anglican Web site www.anglican.org/about/index.html tries to ensure that users recognize the site's own limitations:

People come here looking for many different kinds of help. Sometimes we can provide what you need and sometimes we cannot. Our Web site is not run by any official part of the Anglican church. Rather, it is run by a lay religious society, the Society of Archbishop Justus. We are not priests, not counselors, and we don't have access to confidential or archival information. Often we can help you find the people who can answer your questions, but we don't usually have the answers here on this Web site.

Amen

I began by contrasting organized religions' traditional condemnation of the marketplace, and the resulting admonition against mixing the two, with their recent embrace of business and marketing tools to further religious goals. Yet, perhaps today's use of e-commerce to 'sell' religion to the public ' to take spirituality out of the temple and into today's equivalent of the traditional marketplace, the Internet ' puts the temple exactly where it needs to be, from an evangelist's perspective. Like the stereotypical preacher on a soapbox in the town square, perhaps proselytizing through Web sites such as Beliefnet, or the comparable Web sites of other organized religions cited in this article, is no different from selling any other product or idea online ' by making it easier to reach potential 'customers.' In an era when in-person church attendance is perceived as declining in the Western world (see, www.namb.net/site/apps/nl/content3.asp?c=9qKILUOzEpH&b=1594355&ct=2350673), the Internet is increasingly one place where the 'unchurched' can be reached. Just as missionaries have always gone to the people, religions proselytizing online are simply following their potential membership.

For countless millennia, humanity didn't need the Internet to find what people perceived as the divine ' and believers certainly agree that the divine still doesn't need it to find people. But today, just as the Internet has been used to cut the middleman from everything from retail sales, travel, and other forms of commerce, believers are using it to try to make a direct connection to the spiritual. As in secular matters, the faithful (and perhaps those still unconvinced) go online for virtual spirituality, cutting the middlemen and middlewomen of organized religion to get information and make choices for themselves.

Since religious leaders have always sought adherents wherever they may be found, wouldn't we expect to find them doing their work today in chat rooms and social-networking sites, in an era when we live so much of our lives online? In an era when 'middlemen' in many fields of business have been threatened with extinction by e-commerce, such as travel agents and traditional retailers, maybe organized religious bureaucracies ' the 'middlemen' of spirituality ' have recognized this reality, and gone online simply to survive, thus continuing a centuries-old tradition of believers adopting the latest technology to help advance their mission, and consumers to find what they want.

[Jesus] made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen, and spilled the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said, 'Take these out of here, and stop making my Father's house a marketplace.'

' John 2:13

No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon.

' Matthew 6:24

When the same entertainment network that gave us Family Guy and American Idol (and soon, The Wall Street Journal) does a multi-million dollar buyout of a self-proclaimed 'spiritual Web site,' www.beliefnet.com, no one can deny that the selling of religion online has become big business.

Although the Bible and the Pope may have both condemned mixing commerce and worship (see, www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2007-12-09-pope_N.htm), today the temple referred to in the passage from the Gospel of St. John quoted above appears to have firmly established itself in digital form in the e-commerce marketplace, rather than the marketplace having been set up ' and pitched out of ' the temple.

In December, on the eve of one of the Christian world's holiest celebrations, media mogul Rupert Murdoch's Fox Entertainment Group paid 'tens of millions of dollars,' according to The Wall Street Journal, in its widely reported acquisition of Beliefnet. Beliefnet claims to be the 'largest spiritual Web site ' independent and not affiliated with any spiritual organization or movement, (whose) only agenda is to help you meet your spiritual needs' (see, www.beliefnet.com/about/index.asp, and www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/05/AR2007120500912.html).

Through the Ethernet
To the Great Beyond

Beliefnet is just one of a multitude of virtual spirituality sites working to save actual souls, but carrying out its mission online. For example, the indisputably mainstream Church of England has begun to use the social-networking site Facebook (www.facebook.com) to distribute information through animated Christmas cards 'specially designed' for Facebook users during the Advent season to allow the recipients to find information about their local churches (see, www.cofe.anglican.org/news/pr11407.html). In the words of the Rt. Rev. Pete Broadbent, the Anglican Bishop of Willesden: 'I think this is a brilliant idea. Like a number of my clergy and hundreds of their parishioners, I've got a page on Facebook. It's a quick and easy way for people to stay in touch and the Church needs to use Web sites like this to reach out to as many people as possible.'

In Judaism, which has no central authority governing all aspects of the faith's various denominations, leaders and lay people are using the Internet to inform and aid Jews and to offer information about Judaism to Christians interested in the religion, but not to proselytize, which Judaism frowns on (see, www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/335578/jewish/The-Soul-of-Cyberspace.htm). In a discussion of how technology could promote Judaism's goals for humanity, a noted rabbi (citing the work of a now-deceased but revered leader, who was commenting on the benefits of radio and television in that man's time) even humorously compared the TCP/IP protocol to God, in the power of both to unify people: 'The advance of scientific understanding is increasingly revealing the inherent unity in the universe, as expressed in the forces of nature,' the revered leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch Orthodox Jewish community once said.

Rabbi Yosef Y. Kazen, director of the group's Web sites, is quoted in an article on the Chabad site (see reference above) as more recently saying of the extension of the leader's teaching: 'Because if there's an effect between myself and a person who's in Beijing, or myself and a person in Antarctica, and it's an instant communication, what is the lesson showing us? ' My question is, in a humorous fashion, is TCP/IP [the dominant Internet communications protocol] another name for God? Because in essence, this is a way that you're finding a unity between people.'

e-Ecumenical 'e-Commerce'

Simple online searching or browsing portal sites such as Beliefnet.com will quickly reveal many other faiths' online preaching, net-casting, and information-promulgation. For example, see, www.vatican.va/index.htm, http://www.cofe.anglican.org or www.chabad.org/?gclid=CPT5r8b9m5ACFSSaZQodo2jV7g (one of the many sites offering information on Judaism).

But Mammon, a word that was applied as a name in ancient times and at least through the Middle Ages to a demon and also to riches (sometimes with a connection between riches and iniquity), apparently knows what it is doing when it comes to using e-commerce technology to save souls: The numbers back up Beliefnet's claim to be the largest spiritual Web site. According to recent data from comScore Inc. (see, www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1808), Beliefnet led the pack in the rapidly growing field of religious sites, advancing 13% against the sector's 5% overall growth rate. In fact, after the sale, Beliefnet's founder was quoted in The Financial Times highlighting the pecuniary benefits of the site to its advertisers ' in addition to the spiritual advantages.

'Mr Waldman declined to disclose its financial performance but said Beliefnet's audience had proved particularly appealing to entertainment and pharmaceutical companies. 'In the last few years, national advertisers have awakened in a big way to the need to reach people of faith and spirituality”(see, www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c94daa66-a2c0-11dc-81c4-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1).

Although Beliefnet's founder also claimed, 'We created Beliefnet primarily to make a difference, not a killing,' the sale was immediately perceived by the business press as helping Fox to 'gain a promotional outpost for its religious books and programming businesses ' and to promote religious and spiritual content such as films from Fox Faith as well as books from News Corp.'s HarperCollins book-publishing arm' (see, http://online.wsj.com/article_print/SB119682036169113909.html).

Indeed, Beliefnet uses the latest online marketing techniques, such as its recently formed social networking site Beliefnet Community (still in
beta testing, at http://community.beliefnet.com/index.php?page_id=1000&site_page_id=1). And even through Beliefnet's co-founder's letter about the sale proclaimed the 'high quality spiritual content' that Fox and News Corp. could bring to Beliefnet, he also trumpeted benefits closer to the wallet of the advertiser than to the heart of the preacher.

'This is a thrilling moment for us. As you know, News Corp and Fox own media powerhouses such as Twentieth Century Fox, MySpace, The Wall Street Journal and Fox Network. ' News Corp's reach is enormous. Its proficiency in the areas of video, social networking and media in general is unsurpassed. ' Fox Entertainment Group's goal is to leverage these characteristics across a broader media canvas and provide programming, production, advertising sales, technology and marketing expertise that will enhance a terrific product.'

Miracles, Money, Marketing:
Making the Most of the Net

But the success ' and sale ' of Beliefnet was not a miracle. As have the purveyors of any other product, adherents of religion and spirituality have turned online to sell those beliefs to the masses ' as they have with any other form of e-commerce. As a report from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business noted: 'Reaching non-believers ' known as 'seekers' or the 'un-churched' in evangelical-speak ' is a primary mission of megachurches' (referring to use of general advertising methods for proselytization, rather than online tools specifically). (See, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1605&CFID=36369670&CFTOKEN=47361606&jsessionid=9a30579d90fc2927c272.) As Cornell University Professor R. Laurence Moore was quoted as saying in the same Wharton report: 'Religious organizations actively seeking to grow and expand ' raise money, reach new members ' do things that are as much secular as religious.'

But such efforts have had unanticipated consequences. For example, USA Today recently reported on an explosion in faith-oriented blogs ' and, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, on how they face the same challenges with argumentative believers as their secular real-world counterparts, in 'Bloggers keep the faith, contentiously' (see, www.usatoday.com/tech/webguide/internetlife/2007-11-26-faith-bloggers_N.htm?csp=tech). One spiritual leader who has 'soured on the blogs' incendiary approach' to issues of church governance and religious expressions, even 'fretted ' that battling bloggers frighten off 'lost souls and new believers. ' Lost people are seeing the deep division and sometimes hatred that is flowing forth among churches and among those who are involved in convention discussions. For Christ's sake, stop!” One pastor of a church that has aggressively adopted commercial tactics in its outreach even said, 'At the end of the day, we don't want the church to become a prostitute of business' (see, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1605&CFID=36369670&CFTOKEN=47361606&jsessionid=9a30579d90fc2927c272).

More sedately, a group of Catholic nuns, even though cloistered to separate themselves from the world, received the National Catholic Leadership Award for their Web cam exposition of the Communion Host (see, www.philly.com/philly/news/local/11104577.html). The Pink Sisters won for their 'cutting-edge' ways and their 'insightful use of technology.' Through their Web site, the sisters pray to achieve their 'mission ' of increasing awareness and devotion to our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament. We also seek to bring the live image of His living Presence to the homebound, the workplace, and to remote areas around the world' (see, www.savior.org). The leader of the organization giving the award highlighted this combination of traditional spirituality and today's technologies this way: 'We thought it was really remarkable that these sisters, living a cloistered life most people associate with the Middle Ages, are utilizing the means and methods of today to evangelize.'

Even such bastions of marketplace mores as the Wharton School and Business Week magazine could not ignore how the intersection of online commerce and religion has become big business, by devoting issues to the economic aspects of religion as practiced today. For example, the November edition of Wharton's online newsletter, Knowledge@ Wharton, included a series of studies on projects designed to 'mov(e) development-minded pastors from good intentions to executive ability' (see, http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=1840#). Also, Business Week's May 23, 2005, cover story, 'Earthly Empires,' chronicled how certain congregations 'eager(ly) embrace ' corporate-style growth strategies (to win) ' a tremendous advantage in the battle for religious market share' (see, www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_21/b3934001_mz001.htm).

Moreover, the prestigious Pew Foundation's Internet and American Life Project has issued two reports on the use of the Internet for spiritual purposes. In 2004, it determined that 64% of American Internet users had gone online for 'faith related matters,' including:

• e-Mail with spiritual content;
• Greeting cards related to religious holidays;
• News accounts of religious events;
• Information on religious celebrations;
• Information on where to attend religious services;
• Online prayer requests; and, of course
• Making online donations (see, www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/126/report_display.asp).

An earlier report from the dawn of the populist online era in 2000, 'Wired churches, wired temples: Taking congregations and missions into cyberspace' (see, www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/28/report_display.asp), had already concluded that 'the Internet has become a vital force in many faith communities. Most of the respondents are eager to use their Web sites to increase their presence and visibility in their local communities and explain their beliefs.'

An In-Synch
Institution and Business

Yet, are today's religious groups that use e-commerce to promote their beliefs any different from their predecessors who used the latest technologies of their time to spread their message? For example, the ages-old oral traditions of Judaism were preserved for later generations through the innovation of one of the earliest mass-communication technologies ' written-word scrolls. The growth of Christianity, particularly in the Roman world outside what is now the Middle East, depended on the availability of the Roman road and postal service to circulate the early saints' epistles, particularly to the distant Gentiles. Medieval construction advances made lofty cathedrals possible, whose statues and stained glass windows provided a regular exposure to religious education to the rich and the illiterate alike. In 1452, the Gutenberg Bible became the first book printed on movable type, heralding the start of the Renaissance, and beginning an era when 'most of the earliest books dealt with religious subjects' (see, www.historyguide.org/intellect/press.html). In other words, today's venerable, tradition-bound churches were once the early adopters of technology. Modern emerging spiritual movements, particularly those of Christian evangelicals and fundamentalists, are using e-commerce techniques in exactly the same way, and for the same purpose, as cutting-edge marketers are.

Evangelical Protestant minister Rick Warren commented similarly on the historical roots underlying his use of online evangelization in a Business Week series. 'Every time the Bible is made available through a new technology, there tends to be an awakening,' Warren says. 'The Protestant Reformation occurred after the invention of the printing press. And now we have the Internet. So now I can talk to pastors all around the world. I have a newsletter ' Ministry Toolbox ' that I e-mail to 140,000 pastors every week. That kind of networking promotes growth, but it was not possible 10 years ago' (see, www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_21/b3934015_mz001.htm).

It wasn't long after the dot-com boom of the 1990s that progressive churchmen saw this opportunity. As Pope Benedict's predecessor, John Paul II, noted in his 2001 'Message for World Communications Day': '[T]he Internet (can) carry religious information and teaching beyond all barriers and frontiers. Such a wide audience would have been beyond the wildest imaginings of those who preached the Gospel before us' (see, www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/messages/communications/documents/hf_jp-ii_mes_20010124_world-communications-day_en.html). Even earlier, John Paul II had exhorted his faithful to use new technologies, in his discussion of 'the Christian message in a computer culture,' in his 1990 'World Communications Day Message,' before most techies realized the potential of the Internet outside academia (see, www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/messages/communications/documents/hf_jp-ii_mes_24011990_world-communications-day_en.html):

'With the advent of computer telecommunications and what are known as computer participation systems, the Church is offered further means for fulfilling her mission. Methods of facilitating communication and dialogue among her own members can strengthen the bonds of unity between them. Immediate access to information makes it possible for her to deepen her dialogue with the contemporary world. In the new 'computer culture' the Church can more readily inform the world of her beliefs and explain the reasons for her stance on any given issue or event. She can hear more clearly the voice of public opinion, and enter into a continuous discussion with the world around her, thus involving herself more immediately in the common search for solutions to humanity's many pressing problems. It is clear that the Church must also avail herself of the new resources provided by human exploration in computer and satellite technology for her ever pressing task of evangelization' (see, www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/messages/communications/documents/hf_jp-ii_mes_24011990_world-communications-day_en.html).

That Other 'Higher Authority':
The Law

In one way, at least, online spiritual sites must bow before Mammon: When it comes to the law. The Terms of Service or copyright notice and in some cases, confidentiality disclaimers, that are eternally present on commercial Web sites, appear on many sites devoted to spiritual and religious matters, to guard the owners and others against litigation filed by the unsatisfied, or maybe overzealous or non-religious. On the other hand, perhaps it's not surprising, in context, that some religion sites are so far out-of-market and more concerned with matters of the mind than the marketplace, per se, that they feature no Terms of Use, or other warning or disclosure pages. For these sites, counsel would do well to advise clients who have attorneys to protect themselves by drafting and posting such information. But on the big portals, particularly on commercial sites, the typical Web site boilerplate appears. For example, at www.beliefnet.com/about/terms.asp, Beliefnet.org provides it, but with a reverent genuflection to its loftier purposes. After relatively standard disclosures about content, contests, third-party advertising, and other purely secular concerns, a unique disclaimer appears about 'professional advice':

Disclaimer regarding Professional Advice. Your use of the Site is at your own risk. The relationship between you and Beliefnet is not a physician-patient relationship or a psychotherapist-patient relationship or a priest-penitent relationship. The Beliefnet Content contains information, data, advice, text and other materials compiled from a variety of third party sources. Beliefnet in no way endorses any of these materials, which are provided for your convenience, and are solely intended to broaden user understanding and knowledge of religious and spiritual topics.

Nothing contained in the Site is intended to be, and must not be taken to be, the practice of medicine, including, without limitation, psychology, psychiatry, or psychotherapy, or providing health care advice or instruction for diagnosis or treatment. Beliefnet does not recommend the self-management of health or mental health problems, and the Beliefnet Content is not exhaustive and does not cover all diseases, ailments, physical or mental conditions or their treatments. You should never disregard medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on the Site. (Emphasis added.)

Although most of these paragraphs could be found at any medical or self-help Web site, apparently those seeking help from above need higher warnings. Even the online perpetual-adoration site www.savior.org discloses warnings about pop-up windows, browser optimization and frames. The Jewish outreach site www.chabad.org similarly encourages sharing its message, provided that its copyrights are respected:

The content on this page is copyrighted by the author, publisher and/or Chabad.org, and is produced by Chabad.org. If you enjoyed this article, we encourage you to distribute it further, provided that you comply with the copyright policy. (See, www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/36220/jewish/Our-Tools.)

Similarly, the Anglican Web site www.anglican.org/about/index.html tries to ensure that users recognize the site's own limitations:

People come here looking for many different kinds of help. Sometimes we can provide what you need and sometimes we cannot. Our Web site is not run by any official part of the Anglican church. Rather, it is run by a lay religious society, the Society of Archbishop Justus. We are not priests, not counselors, and we don't have access to confidential or archival information. Often we can help you find the people who can answer your questions, but we don't usually have the answers here on this Web site.

Amen

I began by contrasting organized religions' traditional condemnation of the marketplace, and the resulting admonition against mixing the two, with their recent embrace of business and marketing tools to further religious goals. Yet, perhaps today's use of e-commerce to 'sell' religion to the public ' to take spirituality out of the temple and into today's equivalent of the traditional marketplace, the Internet ' puts the temple exactly where it needs to be, from an evangelist's perspective. Like the stereotypical preacher on a soapbox in the town square, perhaps proselytizing through Web sites such as Beliefnet, or the comparable Web sites of other organized religions cited in this article, is no different from selling any other product or idea online ' by making it easier to reach potential 'customers.' In an era when in-person church attendance is perceived as declining in the Western world (see, www.namb.net/site/apps/nl/content3.asp?c=9qKILUOzEpH&b=1594355&ct=2350673), the Internet is increasingly one place where the 'unchurched' can be reached. Just as missionaries have always gone to the people, religions proselytizing online are simply following their potential membership.

For countless millennia, humanity didn't need the Internet to find what people perceived as the divine ' and believers certainly agree that the divine still doesn't need it to find people. But today, just as the Internet has been used to cut the middleman from everything from retail sales, travel, and other forms of commerce, believers are using it to try to make a direct connection to the spiritual. As in secular matters, the faithful (and perhaps those still unconvinced) go online for virtual spirituality, cutting the middlemen and middlewomen of organized religion to get information and make choices for themselves.

Since religious leaders have always sought adherents wherever they may be found, wouldn't we expect to find them doing their work today in chat rooms and social-networking sites, in an era when we live so much of our lives online? In an era when 'middlemen' in many fields of business have been threatened with extinction by e-commerce, such as travel agents and traditional retailers, maybe organized religious bureaucracies ' the 'middlemen' of spirituality ' have recognized this reality, and gone online simply to survive, thus continuing a centuries-old tradition of believers adopting the latest technology to help advance their mission, and consumers to find what they want.