Cyberspace - a Challenging Battlefield for Christian Ministries in the UK

Nowadays the internet infiltrates into people’s lives every day, and it has become a very powerful tool in promoting ideas. Especially among religious groups, it is not hard to find those who are making good use of the internet and investing a lot to explore a new dimension.

As people enjoy the freedom of cyberspace, the abuse of websites for the communication of radical or wrong messages is a constant occurance. According to SurfControl, a British-based web filtering company, the number of extremist websites espousing violent or racist views has grown by more than 26% since January, which was almost as much as the growth in extremist sites during the whole of 2003. A spokesperson for the Internet Watch Foundation, the UK's monitoring body, said it had seen a 101% increase on the previous year in complaints of racial abuse made through its hotline.

Religious hatred appears to be flourishing on the web. Controversial news headlines about gay marriages, suspected anti-Semitism in Mel Gibson’s the Passion of the Christ, and Christian-Muslim violence, reveal the weaknesses within the Christian communities in the modern world.

In just a click, the hearts and minds of people can change according to the messages received. The Christian community has become very concerned about the situation, and is now preparing to face a severe battle to reverse the increasing trends.

CARE, a Christian social-concern group involved in caring, campaigning and communicating across the UK launched a new website last weekend. The website www.carelinkuk.org, aims to link people with the help they need in their lives of Christianity. It is an online directory providing a list of potentially helpful organisations, free of charge. About 1,000 agencies are already listed, and their number grows daily.

To access the new service, concerned friends, family members, church leaders, project managers or community workers simply need to insert the type of support they are looking for. Then, appropriate information about the specialist caring agencies across the country will be offered to the enquirers in their search result.

CARELINK UK Project Manager Howard Chapman explained the idea, “People are becoming accustomed to searching for information on the internet, rather than phoning around for it. It was felt that the way forward was to put that information on the web.” The website replaces a popular telephone referral helpline formerly run by CARE – which offered callers information on a wide range of issues from marriage counselling to caring for AIDS-stricken families. Users included a woman whose son was battling alcoholism; a father needing debt advice; a girl with an unexpected pregnancy; and a 95-year-old man needing somewhere to stay after hospital.

“We're trying to provide a resource for the wider Christian community that's more in keeping with CARE's mandate. We're empowering Christians to make a difference.” Howard added.

Another website, churchontheweb.com that provides a valuable free service of allowing Christian websites to add their link under one of many categories in the International Directory, was also re-launched last week. Originally launched in 1996 as a teaching ministry, churchontheweb.com was one of the first Christian sites to appear on the web. Now in its new form as a multifaceted search-engine and directory, churchontheweb.com provides a safe search-environment which is appealing to the vast online Christian public, including adults, teens and children alike looking for Christian ministries, churches and resources.

churchontheweb.com has defined the need, and has answered it by creating a portal which is fast becoming a familiar fixture on computers around the world.