Elder Ballard: LDS Church Members Should Blog
Elder Ballard spoke at Brigham Young University-Hawaii recently and he talked about new media - including blogs. He asked students to consider sharing their views about the LDS church on blogs. New media also includes sites like MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, and other sites where you can comment on and respond to articles about the church.
It reminds me of my friends at The More Good Foundation, whose main goal is to have positive and accurate information about the church rank highly in search engines.
I blog for a living (along with some other internet marketing consulting) and I’m a big fan. I agree that it’s important that we as members join in the online conversations about the church. This is like being in the world but not of the world. We leave the bad and benefit from the good.
It’s so nice to see the church say something positive about the Internet. Normally we talk about the dangers of the Internet - pornography and the like. But, as Elder Ballard points out we need to participate so that people get an accurate view of our beliefs.
Here’s a little sneak peek. I’m one of the owners of LDSFriends.com and we’re going to launch the new site soon. It’s a social networking site for members of the LDS church. We’re going to make it easy for anyone who is a part of our community to start a blog. Great news, isn’t it.
Warning: Once you start blogging it will be tough to stop!!
Hi Janet. Thanks for the shout-out. I look forward to seeing your new site. I’ve heard a bit about it from Paul. We recently launched LDS.net (also a social network!) as a way for members to share their beliefs online, with more websites to follow. I think the opportunities to share the Gospel online are tremendous.
Comment by Richard K Miller — January 17, 2008 @ 5:22 pm
Kudos to you, Ms. M., for following Elder Ballard’s advice! I personally feel blogs like yours are a much needed resource for hope and helps initiate both the dumbfounded ne’er-marrieds as well as the devasted divorcees to the beginnings of social interaction again. If he ever had two seconds in his schedule to comment on it, I’m sure our former beloved Pres. Hinckly would have agreed with Elder Ballard too. I may be a little biased by now, but (in my best Adam voice) bless your beautiful hide for being “anxiously engaged” offering more hope to us.
If you’re accepting more writers, I’d like to throw in my two cents once in a while. Thanks.
Comment by Nathan — March 24, 2008 @ 9:45 pm