Culture:
Can Twitter change the world?
As the ‘microblogging’ phenomenon celebrates
its fifth birthday, Martin Saunders asks:
is Twitter a pointless distraction, or does it
offer a landmark opportunity for the Church?
Come, follow me. The famous words
of Jesus have now become a mantra
for a generation, not of disciplemakers,
but of social networkers.
At the leading edge of 21st century
communication, one seemingly humble
idea has helped to change the
way we communicate and relate to one
another. When it launched five years
ago, it looked too simple to make a
splash; now ‘micro-blogging’ website
Twitter is used a billion times a week.
Though it has been keeping the
early adopters busy since 2006,
Twitter now seems to have reached
a sort of cultural tipping point. The
site sees just under half a million users
register for its services each day; while
in the past year usage has almost
trebled. In March 2010, 50 million
messages were being sent through
the site each day; by March 2011,
that figure had reached 140 million.
Facebook’s dominance in the social
media sphere is – almost unthinkably
– being challenged.
While Facebook allowed us to
transfer our human connections
to an online space, Twitter created
opportunities to make new friends. It
took ‘traditional’ blogging – in which
you would write long essays about
your current thoughts, and post them
online for, in most cases, 12 people
to read – and shrunk it down to
microscopic size. Writing for Twitter,
with its 20-30 word maximum, is a
skill; in some cases it’s an art form.
So users read the thoughts of scores
of micro-bloggers within just a few
minutes – in most cases deriving a
different idea from each.
Not only that: they respond; they
join the conversation; they re-tweet
– relaying someone else’s message
to their own pool of followers.
And in this way Twitter becomes
an extraordinarily rich community,
updating at a rate of hundreds of
messages per second, through users
all over the world.
Celebrity involvement – and early
adoption – was a vital and perhaps
unforeseen reason for Twitter’s
success. Many people, like my
mum, know about Twitter because
they know that Stephen Fry uses it.
US President Barack Obama even
tweeted to celebrate victory in the
race for the White House, having seen
Social Media play an important role
in his campaign.
Many users created accounts
because doing so gives them direct
access to people they might admire or
engage with, but who previously they
would never have been able to meet.
On Twitter, you can send a message to
Jonathan Ross, Naomi Klein, Britney
Spears or Rob Bell, and if they’re in a
good mood, receive a reply.
For once, Christians have been
at the forefront of engaging with
Twitter. Many well-known US pastors
– such as Mark Driscoll, John Piper
and Rick Warren – have established
accounts with hundreds of thousands
of followers, through which they
regularly offer their latest theological
musings, or provide links to a new
blog or sermon. More generally
though, Christians are using the site to
debate issues of theology and culture,
often with people they don’t know,
in completely different parts of the
world. Usually this is respectful and
friendly (see the hashtag #lovewins
for a less positive example) but it
is always worth remembering that
these conversations are public; even
though they are taking place between
Christians talking about obscure
details of theology, they could be being
read by anyone. With that caveat in
mind however, a major application of
Twitter for the Church is as a place
to share ideas and enjoy stimulating
discussion about mission and theology
with Christians from all over.
And not just from all over the
world; all over the Church too. Twitter
breaks down denominational and
theological boundaries. Generally
speaking, the tribalism we see in the
physical church, and even in Christian
events and festivals, is less pronounced
in the twitterverse. This can only be
good news for the Church, which often
does unity about as well as three preschoolers
sharing an Iggle Piggle doll.
Twitter also has great missional
potential, which is already being
explored through innovative projects
such as the Evangelical Alliance’s
Natwivity (www.natwivity.com), a
retelling of the Christmas story
through fictionalised 140-character
accounts, and The Passion Experience
(www.thepassionexperience.co.uk), an
initiative developed by a Southend
church, being extended this Easter to
take the story of Christ’s Passion to
Twitter users across the UK. Much
more simply though, Twitter offers a
mechanism for Christians to naturally
‘meet’ and converse with those of
no faith; linking with them naturally
through shared interests. Many of us
find evangelism difficult principally
because we don’t know many non-
Christians – Twitter provides instant
access to millions of them!
Because what Twitter does
ultimately is remove barriers. It
puts every web-enabled person on
the planet on a level playing field,
regardless of age, gender, theology or
celebrity (and auto-translation tools
will soon remove the language barrier).
It offers community which at its best
is supportive, generous and which –
crucially –
listens. As a relatively new
medium of communication for the
Church to embrace it offers so much
promise for the future of mission,
discourse and unity.
So can Twitter truly change the
world? In one sense at least it already
has – the recent political protests seen
around the world simply couldn’t
have happened ten years ago when
we didn’t have social networking. The
ease of engagement and the hyperconnectivity
of it all means it is ripe
for catalysing movements. Could a
new kind of conversation about God
be one of them?
About the author