Hi stardust,

We have already had a response from the General Council officer with respect to the poor communication around the closing.  I'm content to accept that the poor communication is regretted.

As far as spending money on WonderCafe.ca goes it is a matter of prioritizing expenses.  Nobody wins in the wider Church when we are forced to pick and choose ministries to support or ignore.

Unfortunately that is the place that the Church finds itself in.

If WonderCafe.ca is named a congregation it becomes responsible for its own finances. and I wouldn't be surprised if that only delays the closing by some margin.

Depends on the context.  The letter I wrote to Mr. Benson didn't call for it so none of it appeared in the letter.

Mr. Benson wanted so techinical ideas and that simply is not an area of knowledge I can lay claim to.  I hope that there has been ongoing conversation with members here at WonderCafe.ca who do have expertise in that matter.  I have no idea if that is actually the case.

Cost is one of several factors to be considered.  Whether it is a major problem or not I don't know.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Methinks we are derailing Pinga's thread, Pan. This is an interesting topic, but probably we should give it its own thread in Politics or Social.

Mendalla

"wondercafe" offers what the institution is seeking, a place for the hearing of diverse and divergent perspectives. It is a place where we communicate, that is, we gather here as communicants*, we are in communion**.

We are persons who gather here to communicate, each of us from some particular geographical and social location, by technological means. I am assuming that we are, each and all, persons who also step away from our keyboards to express our insights and convictions in meaningful contextual actions, in concert with community and/or congregational partners.

I note such things while thinking through the change to "unitedfuture"? One thing stands out for examination. "wondercafe" is an open space, where all may express a point of view, all may consider the points of view made manifest, and some may come to places of decision and reconsideration of priorities and commitments. First blush, it appears that "unitedfuture" will be an administered space, where organizers will set the agenda and participants will provide input and feedback.

I am left wondering, what does "unitedfuture" offer that "wondercafe" does not? Does it represent a forward step or a lateral, perhaps backward, step?

Holding two conversations in tension and perhaps drifting.

George

Edit:

*Communicant:

1:  a church member entitled to receive Communion; broadly :  a member of a fellowship
2:  one that communicates; specifically :  informant

**Communion:

1. the sharing or exchanging of intimate thoughts and feelings, esp. when the exchange is on a mental or spiritual level.
2. the service of Christian worship at which bread and wine are consecrated and shared.
 

Thx. Rev. John for your response upthread.

For anyone interested here is a Google Group  UC forum on church technology but its more interested in websites being formulated for UC  churches rather than info. about church forums such as the WC.

My point, exactly.

Well put, George. That's a useful and helpful clarification.

Paradox, my congregation is in it's second year of amalgamation and it is a very painful process . If there was any way to belong to a community without all this formal set up, just for the sake of communication, as Arminius so well said,which it has been on WC, I would quit membership in any congregation.

mrs. anteater

Yikes......food for thought...perhaps  the UC is afraid of losing more parishioners from the churches to the WC  altho' this isn't what you are saying. Its just a thought. It  certainly wasn't their intention  when they opened the WC in 2006. We do have people saying the WC is their church, me too.

Mrs.anteater, 

If you would like to talk more about the amalgamation process I would be interested in hearing about it. I know amalgamations don't always go well and it sounds like yours has been rough. 

Compared to my real life congregation, there has been greater depth and breadth to the discussions here on wondercafe over the last few years. We have various study groups and small group gatherings in RL but the problem is they only attract a few participants and always the same individuals. 

I am surely going to miss wondercafe when it closes. I have learned so much here about our denomination and about various theological perspectives. I have also enjoyed the fun and fellowship aspect. 

A really interesting thought, Stardust! 

From what I have read so far I suspect that absolutely no-one knows a perfect solution for the quandary we seem to be living in.  Personally speaking, I really don't care whether we are officially declared to be a UC congregation or anything else UC.  There seem to be endless official hoops to jump through to achieve that and I doubt that it is worth the effort. 

When I started attending a UC congregation I was immediately asked to become a member, an offer I declined until I had some understanding of what that might entail.  After a period of time I could no longer ignore the disconnect between myself and the rest of the congregation and wider church.  Apparenly the decision to not be a member right away meant a total lack of inclusion in any other aspect of church.  I was 'there' but not really 'one of us'.  Within the wider community there are other ways to connect, discuss, socialise, volunteer etc.that don't involve rule books, traditions, layers of oversight and endless conversations about what the rules actually mean.

To be serious for a moment, to actually go through the process of becoming a groundbreaking "virtual congregation" that is part of the UCCan would spell the end of my involvement. I do not wish to belong to a church. In fact, I very much wish to not be part of a church. I would rather be set upon by a pack of wild dogs.

I think the best thing is to make it an informal group, carry on by ourselves, and see what happens.

I like the idea of a virtual congregation inside the UCC. I think it's time has come.  I can see a virutal congregation sponsering and running Wondercafe (as the GCO does now), but I can not not see wondercafe itself being the virtual congregation. 

Hopefully people understand the difference.

Its not just atheists  who would have a problem belonging to a congregation, but also members of other churches. and spiritual communities.

Setting up a virutal congregation will take time. In the meantime if we can not get somebody at GCO to sponser WC, we may look at a presbertry (i would guess one the ones in ALberta are the most open minded) or a local congregation. (Seelers, or Pinga' congregations comes to mind, as they both sound vibarant, Affirming  and open minded, and in both Pinga and Seeler we have advocates who are good at advocacy and have knowledge and communication skills. 

Hi stardust,

I suspect this is not a legitimate fear within the UCCAN.  Quite frankly if more of the UCCAN was actually actively involved in WonderCafe.ca I suspect that things would be progressing much differently than they currently are.

While true I suspect that there are just as many, if not more at WonderCafe.ca who do not describe WonderCafe.ca as their church.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Hi chansen,

Thank you for putting this out there.

As the conversation unwinds I find myself more opposed to the idea.

Grace and peace to you.

John

To be fair, I think most WC members could have figured that one out on their own.

Agreed. At this point I am thinking we don't even need to bother preserving all the old threads. If we are going to recreate ourselves as a new entity we can simply start over. 

Not even sure I will join the new group. Maybe it is just time to let this go. As valuable as it has been, much of the learning and healing that happened here for me was a few years ago already. Same thing for the fun and fellowship although I continue to enjoy this site and will surely miss it. 

We could probably arrange the wild dogs. Or at least some fierce domesticated German Shepherds. Or maybe a mimniature poodle who's been known to nip. Whatever will help you come to faith, chansen, we're here to help!

First, the archive of threads here represents something to some of us. I'm proud of my contributions here. I also have some personal reasons to see some threads survive.

Second, I think any continuation of the forum would be aided by the continuation of existing conversations. At the very least, we should move the last month's worth of threads, to give people a jumping off point. And if we're doing that, it's not much more difficult to move the entire forum. It'll just be a larger transfer.

I used to fight a big german shepherd every week. My parent's dog was a beast. We had great fun, and those who saw us probably worried for my safety. If I had him in a hold, he'd try to get a grip on me. He'd squeeze harder and harder until I let go. Damn, I miss him. He had a degenerative hip problem and eventually became paralyzed and had to be put down. Born in 2000 and put down in 2009, he could have been with us today. Carter would have loved him - they would have been so much alike.

I still think I could take on one big dog. A pack would be more challenging. A pack of Christians has proven to be quite doable. ;)

paradox3

You've brought up a good point about whether or not you would join a new forum. I don't like to tell the proposed new Admins. what to do ( or Pinga).  Still  it might be a good idea to pose this question in general to the WC members to see what number are interested?    Personally I might not always post or participate  a great deal but I would join and contribute monetarily if required. ( Some of us are getting old and ragged around the edges)

@Rev. John

Points taken. Thx.

Paradox,

The diversity and the knowledge available here has been the great benefit for me as well. In RL congregation the availability of spiritual discussions is usually limited to Lent or Advent- and it tends to be the same people.

I just recently tried to start an ongoing adult discussion group and a book study- against resistance for 5 month! (My hunch is they did not consider me worthy leading a faith formation group and I made it too obvious that I am convinced that we do not need a minister for that, but could do that on our own...).

I think I would join another site if it is easy to handle...I would like the connection to the UCC for the advertising part and the link, so it doesn't end up being the old crew who slowly dies. Older UCC people might be hesitant to join a site , if it is not "offical".

I would not want to miss the diversity of believers and non-believers, and congregation status would cut that out. Having two kinds of people on the site "class 1 UCC members" (paying) and class 2 "all others" would definitely deter me.

So, this conversation ended months ago; however, the short commentary on the topic that I was asked to write back then was just printed in the Observer.

Should be interesting to see if anyone reads it.

Note: It will be an opportunity to write a letter to the editor, announcing wondercafe2 and  the path that we chose to go.

AND THE IRONY is thaat "FISHING FROM THE OTHER SIDE" talks about congregations and in other forms including an online community.  We'd fit right into their vision of the church in the future-unfortunately we don't fit in the UCC of the present.

Nice opinion piece, Pinga ~ I just read it.  Made me a bit sad to see the bureaucracy of 'church' lagging behind the needs of the people.

where can i find this peice of literature?  what section is it in?

Is it available online?

don't think so

Is this in the most recent edition of the Observer - which I haven't opened yet?

yes, gecko

That's a very nicely written article Pinga! I am glad they published it!

A

Our Observer comes later = next week.

Could someone scan it?

That would be lovely. I'd love to read it.

Is it anywhere in here:

http://www.ucobserver.org/

I cant find it waterfall

Okay thanks for trying. I don't know Pingas real name to know which one may have been her's.

I am quite of outed for my real name with the article, but hey, this too shall soon pass, and many people on wondercafe from the area and afar know it 

I can see if I can scan it tonight.

It was good of the observer to find space for it.  Although the conversation had kind of ended **here & on facebook*, there will be  folks who read it for the first time and it will stir conversation similair to what we had.  This is good

It also allows us to use it to say, hey, we decided to move on.

This is the article.  I tried to scan it and upload here and my computer locked up....so typing it in.

"Could Wondercafe become a congregation?"

WonderCafe.ca will shut down at the end of this month.  Launched by the United Church in 2006 as an online discussion forum for believers and faith seekers, it allowed people like me to find a virtual faith community and debate the big questions.  In time, social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter overtook its role and fewer people accessed the site.

Does it really have to be over?  I think not.  My solution:  save WonderCafe by turning it into a congregation.  Here are my best three arguments:

We are already a faith community.  According to Matthew 18:20, "For where two or three gather in my name, there I am with them."  At WonderCafe, believers, agnostics and atheists explore, argue and learn.  It can be raucous.  Yet, in that cacophony, there are deep "aha" moments and holy ground is found.  We are transformed.

We care for one another.  WonderCafe welcomes those who enter angry or weary from the world.  Their presence can simply be a shadow: a visitor to the site receiving solace from the inventory of written words.  Day and night, the door is open and tea is poured, with companionship, wisdom and prayer offered by those with life experience or professional skills.  Care is extended to the physical world through prayer shawls, visits and even interventions for individuals at risk.

The Manual doesn't rule it out.  Section 4.2 of the Manual states that "a local church is a body of persons meeting for public worship in one place."   There is no requirement for property owenership.  Meetings of the courts allow for conference calls and webcams.  The WonderCafe community could readily fulfil all the responsibilities of a congregation as outlined in the Manual, including calling a minister.

by Pinga

Very well written Pinga! Thanks gecko46!

so, the intro was amended slightly, as i don't think that i put the facebook/twitter stuff in, but, hey, I can live with it.

It is a great article Pinga but I was thinking about paying a minister, paying presbytery,

but on the other hand WonderCafe would be a great place to have a Presbytery meeting and we have plenty of Revs to choose from.     

Hey, it was just one of those things....

Well written Pinga. Nicely done.

tanks gecko46

and tightly-written, Pinga :3

thanks, word count wss preset

This part didn't sound like you:

That's the stock answer that was fed to us. The second part - that fewer people accessed the site - I don't doubt. That it was because of Facebook and Twitter is more than curious. How many people who no longer use Wondercafe.ca are regulars on the UCCan twitter feed or Facebook page? What level of conversation takes place on Facebook?

People write novellas on Wondercafe. People mostly click "Like" on Facebook.

That's just the same debunked line being recycled again. Maybe if you repeat it enough times, it will magically become true.

^^ I agree.  I was confused when I read the FB/twitter part.  I thought it was very odd that you would have written that.

Thanks for writing the article Pinga!