As Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) have entered homes and more, so Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) research has expanded to examine new motivations for coordination and communications. Recently this has grown to include a focus on religion. But, yet, while the uses of ICTs by practitioners of a variety of faiths have been examined, far less is known about how officials within religious institutions adopt, use and reject ICTs. In this paper, we report findings from a study of American Protestant Christian ministers' use of ICTs. We present findings and discuss the use of systems in church management, worship, pastoral care, and outreach, and the challenges in integrating ICTs into religious practice. Despite these difficulties, we found that ministers, chose to experiment with ICTs because of their ability to sustain, reinforce and grow their church (laity and ministry collectively) community.
In this paper, we report findings from a study of American Christian ministers' uses of technologies in religious practices. We focus on the use of technologies for spiritual purposes as opposed to pragmatic and logistical, but report on all. We present results about the uses of technologies in three aspects of religious work: religious study and reflection, church services, and pastoral care. We end by examining how the collaborative religious uses of technologies cross and blend work and personal life.
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