Quaker Outreach and Radical Welcome in the Digital Age
(This is the general workshop outline/resources that I have offered among Friends in the past year.)
What challenges come to us as Quakers when we seek to share our gifts of Spirit and community in an ever-changing technological world? What is our experience of Quaker faith in community, how do we invite newcomers and seekers into that shared work, and how does our presence in the world grow faithfully in online spaces? In this workshop, we will share some of our findings, hopes, and concerns around translating our lives as Quakers, focusing specifically on how new and varied media platforms offer both challenge and opportunity for “letting our lives speak.”
Through conversation, activities, and reflection, we will learn from each other on how to embody and share our Quaker testimonies in a wide array of (perhaps) less familiar, digital forms. Topics to be covered include: what gifts the Quaker Way holds for others in our current world, best practices designed for various digital platforms and spaces, creative (and free!) digital tools for your meeting to discover, and potential obstacles to fully sharing our welcome. We hope to have brief discussions, interactive group inquiry, and resources for you to take back to your meetings for continued sharing and discussion.
Workshop Resources:
Workshop topics and links to blog posts/writings:
- Websites are for newcomers
- Simple, Relevant, Amusing (Friends Journal)
- ePublishers of Truth – The Shared Lessons of Strengthening a Movement Among Friends (Friends Journal)
- 7 Advices For Online Gospel Ministry (Friends Journal)
- Social Media as a Spiritual Practice (Friends General Conference)
- An Experiment With Abundance (Friends Journal)
- Should our Meeting have a Facebook presence?
- Facebook posting – content suggestions
- Setting Up your meeting’s Facebook Page
- Creating a Facebook Event
- Instagram and Twitter – basics
- Copyright and Fair Use – Images
- A Guide to Creating GIFs
- Facebook Live – making the church visable
- How to use Canva to create graphics
- What’s in a meme? Humor as outreach and engagement
- Social Media Ads Project – Emily Provance, NYYM
Mindful use of media and digital sabbath:
- Creating a Social Media Policy for your Meeting
Technology as a useful tool - Let Your Life Speak – Don’t lose your sanity
- Privacy, Openness in digital spaces
- DRAFT_NEYM Social Media Guidelines
- Dear Facebook, I think I want to quit you (written by Scott Gunn, an Episcopal priest)
- Facebook: Ministry Opportunity or Pointless Burden? (Scott Gunn)
- Inner Peace and the right use of social media: T Shillitoe makes me think (Brian Drayton)
Handouts:
- Questions for social media use for Quaker Community
- 7 Advices for Online Gospel Ministry
- Quaker Meeting/Church Website Checklist
- Facebook – a tool for Meeting Outreach
- NEYM Social Media Guidelines
- Social-Media-Strategy-for-Churches
General Helpful Links:
- Mission, Method, Media – Julie Lytle, from her book Faith Formation 4.0
- Faith and Leadership (Duke Divinity) Resources for Church Communications
- Web IQ Quiz – Pew Research Institute
- Belief-O-Matic – “What Religion am I?”
- (the internet test I took that led me to Quakers)
- Screenagers – Tech Talk Tuesdays
Video Links:
- Socialnomics 2018 – Erik Qualman
- Don’t Be That Church – Social Media
- Don’t Be That Church II – We Need a New Website
- The Social Church – Justin Wise
- Medieval Help Desk
- A Perfectly Tweetable Sermon – Keith Anderson
- Networked and Wireless Faith – Keith Anderson
- Words Create Worlds #TheologyofTwitter – Jim Keat
- The Tweethood of all Believers #TheologyofTwitter – Jim Keat
- God is the Tweet and You are the Hashtag #TheologyofTwitter – Jim Keat
- Weird Quaker Tweets – Quakerspeak
- Jimmy Fallon – “Hashtag”
Links to Kathleen on Facebook: