Pastor Rick Warren has over 600,000 followers on Twitter. Warren\u2019s Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California has over 20,000 \u201clikes\u201d on Facebook and a sophisticated website where visitors can check the events calendar, watch streaming video of sermons, and post comments. Warren, however, seems to be the exception rather than the rule. Although a few churches are using social media to connect with their congregants quite effectively, most places of worship have sparse online offerings and few Americans report using technology or social media for religious purposes.<\/p>\n
Public Religion Research Institute\u2019s July Religion & Politics Tracking Survey found that only 5% of Americans follow a religious or spiritual leader on Twitter or Facebook, and that only 6% joined a religious or spiritual group on Facebook. Given that successful models of social media integration already exist, what\u2019s stopping most places of worship from upgrading to Religion 2.0?<\/p>\n
Churches and other places of worship wishing to leverage social media tools like Facebook and Twitter face two major obstacles: a lack of resources to invest in new technology, at least for most churches, which tend to be relatively small; and low congregant interest in these forms of communication.<\/p>\n