My Lutheran Heritage: Pr. Friedrich Wilhelm Gotthilf Matuschka
Recently I’ve become interested in my family history, particularly as it relates to Lutheran pastors in the family. My great-great grandfather was Friederich Wilhelm Gotthilf Matuschka. He was born on July 9, 1838 in Berlin, the son of Gotthilf Matthes Matuschka, a Wendish tailor. They had little money, and Wilhelm left home when he was [...]
Eight Steps to the Radically Transparent Church
Radical Transparency is all the rage right now. With President Obama opening access to government data in order to encourage transparency, more attention is being paid to the way that restricting information restricts collaboration, decision making, and progress. This is, however, a value derived strongly from the Internet – more specifically, from the Freedom Software [...]
Why Church search engine optimization (SEO) is more important now than ever
Poorly optimized church websites are getting lower search engine rankings when competing with professional “directory” services. A few years ago, when you did a Google search for “church city, state” you would get, by and large, a list of websites and relevant news articles connected to churches in that community. It wasn’t perfect, and sometimes [...]
The Coming Death or Rebirth of Church Publishing
Every church I’ve ever attended has had to spend time, energy, and money contending with copyright infringement. Every duplicated hymn in the bulletin, every extra copy of music for the musicians, etc. is potentially a source of copyright violations. Many churches work hard to prevent this kind of problem with organizations like CCLI (Christian Copyright [...]
Leadership Styles and Cultural Preferences
I just got back from the Central States Synod candidacy retreat, and it was a very interesting experience. Our retreat was led by the very capable Betty Heier of the Nebraska Synod candidacy committee, and we focused primarily on The Delicate Art of Dancing with Porcupines by Bob Phillips. Phillips deals with differences in “social [...]
Church Demographics and Use of Technology
I’ve been pondering the impact that a good church website can have upon church attendance, growth, and demographics. In fact, I had a lovely conversation with Susan Ebertz here at Wartburg this morning about this very topic, as one of her teaching interests is technology in ministry. A few thoughts from that conversation:
“Freedom Software” versus “Free Software”
“‘Tis but thy name that is my enemy; …O, be some other name! What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet…” – Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet Perhaps the most frustrating thing for me as an advocate for the use of Free(dom) software in the church [...]
Why Open Source Software is like Church Coffee Beans
No organization in the United States has a stronger incentive for using open source software than the Church. “The Church is always asking for money!” – Everyone. In a way, that’s right; the church is always in need of money. Money for ministry, outreach, and evangelism. Money for books and materials. Money to pay salaries [...]
Three steps to Open Source in the Church
The history and legacy of the Church in the late 1990s and 2000s will be lost in 10 years because we will lack the software to open its’ data. Check out this Microsoft KB article. It describes a (very complicated, very technical) process for reconfiguring your computer after Office 2003 Service Pack 3 quietly disables [...]
Christian Ethics and the Right to Vote
The issues of abortion, euthanasia, the war, and political and economic justice place myself and many other people in a trap between the two major political parties in the United States. Often times people like me have been derided as “single issue voters,” though that has never been true for me. The choices involved, presented [...]