Community Network

By Catherine on 12/12/11

I recently had the privilege of sitting down with fellow Christ Church-ers and discussing how we can love our cities as individuals and as a community.   How can the community we find through Christ Church support and propel us to actively love our neighbors -- beyond what is required of us through a Project Peace event?  How can we spend ourselves such that we need and rely on the community we find through Christ Church?  Although the time together was encouraging and refreshing, we acknowledged that the solution is not another weekly meeting together to wrestle through the same questions -- we desire organic over programmatic -- we want real relationship with each other and with our city.

Bear with what I am about to say….. I started to think about our online community network, "The City".  I know, I cannot really believe it myself.  Could the network ever be organic?  Conversations about our online community network (or the Interweb City as I heard last night) usually involve eye-rolling, sarcastic tones, laughter, and “I am sorry, but it’s true” looks shot in my direction.  I agree with you all.  The community network is not the perfect tool and we deal with its shortcomings daily.  However, I do believe it does some things really well and I believe we haven’t really tapped into what it could do for us as a community.   
 
What if The City held exciting, current information about what was going on in our cities?  What if The City was the place you shared your needs and learned about the needs of others?  What if you looked on The City for prayer requests?  My community group talks often about longing for the spontaneous, not programmatic encounter -- what if you posted last minute that you are going to walk around the lake if anyone wants to join?  Could The City help us (beyond scheduled meetings) to carry Church with us throughout the week?  My vision is still being developed, but I can see it being beautiful.  It is not the tool itself, but what the tool makes possible.  
 
On a practical note, ACS, the group that recently purchased The City from Zondervan, held a webinar to discuss what 2012 looks like for The City.  Although much of the technology discussion was over my head, I took away that they are working on changing the architecture of the program to enable it to integrate with specialized applications.  So instead of The City spending time and resources trying to re-invent an application that someone else already does really well, we will be able to plug that app into The City and get the best of both worlds.   I was really encouraged that the aspects of The City that are cumbersome, slow, or ineffective will not always be that way!!
 
Whether or not you can envision the OCN being beautiful and awesome, the church heavily relies on it as a directory, a financial database, and an event-planning tool.  As a staff member, I conclude with 3 sincere requests:
  1. Keep your address current.  If you want privacy, you can select “Private” where no one but staff can see it.  
  2. Put your picture in your profile.  It is SO incredibly powerful and helpful to be able to attach a name to a face.  Help us build community in this simple way.
  3. RSVP for events at least 7 days in advance.  I know for many it seems weird to RSVP for church meetings, but at our size it is crucial that we are able to anticipate the number of adults and children to appropriately plan for food, childcare, and choice of venue.
Thankful to be sharing this East Bay life with you all,
Catherine
 
 




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