World’s first Online Church facing closure this weekend

Church of Fools’ pilot project will end this weekend on Sunday 26th September 2004. The Church of Fools, which is the world’s first 3D place of worship was initially created as a three-month experiment, and was launched at the National Christian Resources Exhibition on May 11th in the UK.

Since its release the website has attracted thousands of people from across the globe to be part of the virtual congregation. More than half of these visitors were also under 30 years old, and 60 percent of them were surveyed to be male.

These surprising statistics convinced the church’s creators to extend their experiment with hope that a new lower costing and improved version of the software could be developed.

However, Simon Jenkins, the editor of the parent website, shipoffools.com, had to make the following announcement:

“Sadly, we have not been able to achieve this (cheaper, improved software), so the church is to close after Night Prayer on Sunday. Morning and Night Prayer will continue as normal through the rest of this week. We hope to open for as long as possible on Sunday. There will be a special closing service at 8pm (UK time), followed by final Night Prayer at 11pm (also UK time).”

Jenkins was not too disappointed, however, and was quick to point out that the fact that the online church has existed at all was something of a miracle in itself.

“Nothing could have happened without our sponsors: the UK Methodist Church, the Christian Resources Exhibition and the Bishop of London, who preached at our first service,” said Jenkins. “We were encouraged to be working alongside top London interactive media specialists special moves, who designed and constructed the church and went more than the extra mile in ideas and enthusiasm.

“The massive coverage given to the church by the media meant we were "raged" by trolls during the difficult middle weeks of the experiment. Our team of highly-motivated volunteer church wardens saved us from going under several times. Despite the setbacks, we learned a huge amount in the process.”

For the church to progress further, there will have to be extensive changes to the software used, which will come at a high cost and take time.

“While the church is offline, we'll investigate and apply for funding from a variety of sources,” said Jenkins. “We remain absolutely committed to developing the church and bringing it back online as soon as possible.”

Regular visitors to the church have shown disappointment with the closure, but have also shown a determination.

“The church was a meditative spot for me, an oasis in my day,” said Radalyn from Georgia, USA. “I often left my “ghost” alone in the church at prayer while I worked nearby.”

Another visitor commented, “This church has been a part of my life for the past four months. I have made many friends here, and found the prayer services wonderful and very uplifting.”

“I truly worshipped during the services each evening, and it has been good to exchange views with others from around the world,” said another UK visitor. “I shall pray that funding will be forthcoming. There are many of us who consider the outreach value is tremendous, quite apart from the fellowship we personally received.”