St Saviour’s Church has just signed up to the C of E’s Digital Charter. Clare Shearing explains why.
The Church of England’s Digital Charter
Truth, kindness, welcome, inspiration, togetherness, safeguarding … it may seem self-evident that these words should be a framework for good communication in a church. As we all know, technology has many plus sides, allowing our communication to be immediate, interactive, conversational, and spontaneous – to name but a few. But along with these opportunities come potential downsides if we forget to interact in the digital world in the same way as we would with face-to-face contact. To address this tension, the Church of England has drawn up its own digital charter, a voluntary pledge that we can all sign up to – both as individuals and as churches – ‘to help make social media and the web more widely positive places for conversations to happen’. The charter encourages us to be as loving and generous in the digital world as we would be in person, with truth, kindness, welcome, inspiration, togetherness, safeguarding as our touchstones. To find out more and to sign up for yourself, go to churchofengland.org/charter.
Our social media community
As a church, this digital charter underlines the value of the Biblical standards that underpin all our communication, with particular relevance to our social media platforms: Facebook (page and group), Twitter, Instagram. We love to see your reactions and interactions with our posts and events, and hope that the charter will encourage us all to continue to ‘think before we post on social’! Is it true? Is it kind? Is it inspiring? Is it encouraging unity? Is it helpful and safe?
And while we are on the subject of our social media, how would we like our social media community to grow? Are there avenues we should be exploring to show our love and care for our local community? Are there ways we can be encouraging one another more? Do we want less of ‘this’, and more of ‘that’? [*Add your own words!] We can’t please everybody, but we’d love to hear your constructive ideas. And, I’d love some help with taking photos at our various events, activities, and groups – I can’t be everywhere!
So, please get in touch if you have ideas about our social media, or a camera/phone! I’d love to hear from you. You all have so many gifts and insights, and I always pick up interesting ideas and information, so keep it coming! Thank you for your support and encouragement.
‘Gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones.’ Proverbs 16: 24
Clare Shearing, church communications officer
