Update on Virtual Church for Kids

My colleague Olli mailed me an update for the virtual church for kids post from last week.

According to Helsingin Sanomat (HS) the chat area of Lastenkirkko ("Children's Church") had to be closed down right after the service had started because of anti-religious and ill-mannered discussion. The virtual church itself has already attracted lots of discussion and debate. Even the number of comments to HS's report added up to 384 this morning.

What a perfect example of the pros and cons of Internet as an open forum for discussion.

Just a thought: would it be an interesting experiment if a religious virtual world would be open for any kind of development - Hindu temples, atheist information booths (with Richard Dawkins' avatar), new age spiritualists, newborn Christian preachers and even Satanists. Then an avatar could browse through all sorts of virtual religions and decide for itself. Click and be saved!


Pic: "Blake Wake Visits Pixel Jesus in a Cave" by Dean Terry in Flickr.

Virtual Church for Kids

Reading Digitoday a few days ago, I noticed how the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Finland is trying to reach kids in cyberspace by launching a new Flash-based virtual world called Lastenkirkko ("Children's Church").

Like in Habbo, "the hangout for teens", in Lastenkirkko kids can create their own avatar, dress it up and chat away with friends. The church is open for kids' chatter only from 3 to 5 pm when the moderator is present. On other times kids are only allowed to use smileys to communicate with each other.

A juvenile Cyber-Christian can also listen to the stories of Bible, read prayers or just play games. Kids can also have their avatar blessed at the altar, play the organ or visit the grave yard.

Lastekirkko is a laudable move from the Church. It hints towards religion becoming less serious and conservative. Moreover, it is yet another interesting sign of the cultural dynamics of digital age. Virtual worlds are not seen merely as games or something unreal anymore but places of real and useful societal action. It seems like even the most conservative organizations have to have a virtual world entity nowadays. Or maybe the Church has started taking advice from Big Tobacco and catching them while they're young?

But when are the cyborg priests coming?

Pics: the virtual altar from Lastenkirkko, Futurama's robot priest from Futurama and Religion.