(2 of 7)
The harvest is even more bountiful on the Web, where everyone from Lutherans to Tibetan Buddhists now has a home page, many crammed with technological bells and whistles. Mormon sites offer links to vast genealogical databases, while YaaleVe' Yavo, an Orthodox Jewish site, forwards E-mailed prayers to Jerusalem, where they are affixed to the Western Wall. Two Websites are devoted to Cao Daiism, the tiny Vietnamese sect that worships French novelist Victor Hugo as a saint, and a handful probe the mysteries of Jainism, an Indian religion in which (as one learns on the Net) the truly faithful sweep the ground with a small broom to avoid accidentally stepping on insects or other hapless creatures. Even the famously technophobic Amish are represented online by a Website run by Ohio State University. It offers, among other things, a guide for installing a rear warning light on a horse-drawn carriage.
Perhaps the most ambitious site on the Web is the one now being patiently cobbled together on the first floor of the Vatican's Apostolic Palace. First launched in 1995 (and soon overloaded by an "E-mail the Pope" feature that proved far too popular), the Holy See's redesigned site will be unwrapped some time around Christmas. Running 24 hours a day on three powerful computers (nicknamed Raphael, Michael and Gabriel), it will offer Vatican press releases, John Paul II's schedule and most of the Pontiff's writings, translated into six languages. It will also have the capacity to field thousands of simultaneous information requests from all over the world. "The Internet is exploding, and the church has got to be there," says Sister Judith Zoebelein, the American-born nun who runs the site. "The Holy Father wanted it." Indeed, the Pope, who has always looked for innovative ways to spread the word, including travel, books and even records, was writing as early as 1989 about the opportunities offered by computer telecommunications to fulfill the church's mission, which he called the "new evangelization."
It's a message other churches ignore at their peril. The faithful, according to a recent study by Barna Research in Glendale, California, are moving online every bit as fast as the rest of the world. After interviewing hundreds of wired Christians, Barna concluded that churches that don't establish a presence in cyberspace will start to seem badly out of touch with their parishioners. "The failure to do so," according to the study, "sends an important signal about the church's ability to advise people in an era of technological growth."
In this area the faithful seem to be leading their churches, instead of following, opening an unusually lively colloquy. It is the nature of computer networks that they tend to throw together people who would otherwise never meet--never mind discuss something as intimate as one's personal beliefs. Thus on the Internet, Catholics suddenly find themselves keyboard-to-keyboard with devil worshippers, Jews modem-to-modem with Islamic fundamentalists. "I put the [Reverend Moon's] Unification Church right up there with the wonderful world of Mormon," someone with the screen name Marzioli posted recently on a Usenet newsgroup. The next message snapped back, "Marz, you are an ignorant disinformationist. Wake up, man!!!"