Martin Marty on blogging and denominational politics
Safely one generation (which means about two and a half years) behind on each unfolding of new technology, I had to do some research via print media, my natural home, and the web itself. The latter took me to any number of formal comments about blogs, and to blogs about blogs. Several things come to mind at once. First, blogs are democratic, since geniuses and self-advertised idiots have equal access. Second, they can in rare instances be creative, since the human imagination, unrestrained especially when it belongs to an anonymous person, can come up with ingenious notions. Third, they can represent the worst kind of populism, allowing for every prejudice and idiocy to go unmonitored and criticized only by other bloggers. Cruise the web and you will find evidences abundant.
Last Thursday I spoke to the American Theological Library Association at its annual meeting. Several people who approached me after the talk mused about how the blog will change denominations and other religious structures. No one yet knows how or how much. They agree that it’ll be somewhat harder for backroom dealers to deal, power-brokers to go for broke, and establishments to keep reestablishing their power, limited as that is in denominations these days.
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