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Annotated Bibliography

How Has Technology and Social Media Changed the Christian Church?

Graham Martin

Professor Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1104

March 19th 2019

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Annotated Bibliography

McKinney, Derick. "Social media in the church". ProQuest. ProQuest Dissertations & Theses

Global.2014.​https://librarylink.uncc.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.librarylin

k.uncc.edu/docview/1640930522?accountid=14605​. 6 March 2019

This section of an academic thesis paper starts off talking about the method of a study

that will be done to examine the effectiveness of social media in the church. The church

the author works with is New Heights Church in Fayetteville, Arkansa. This church was

established in 2001 and has seen rapid growth in the years following. The church is run

by a board of elders who make all the decisions for the church as a team. Each decision

must be agreed on unanimously by all the elders. The church is heavily involved in the

community and partners with other ministries thus making this churches reach very long.

Which is why the author aims to show them how to use social media to effectively

communicate with people. The author plans to instruct the church on their social media

use for a year and then will collect data at the end and see if any impact was made in their

church. The author's thesis is based on previous research which is explored later in the

paper. A survey of 250 churches showed that just under half of those churches consider

social media to be the most effective way for communication. Churches who use social

media tend to have better attendance and member involvement. The author, Derrick

Mckinney, is a graduate student pursuing a Masters Degree of Arts and Journalism. The

information in this paper is reliable since it was written and reviewed by many

journalists, but that doesn't take away the clear bias the author has. Religion is a topic that

is almost impossible to discuss without any opinion mixed in. The author clearly presents
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what he believes to be a bible believing church and offers his own definitions for bible

believing christians and even warns churches to not rely too much on marketing. Despite

his passionate opinions, the author gives this source tons of research to support his belief

that churches should utilize social media more. The source’s audience is mostly people

who work for or run churches because the goal of the paper is to show how social media

can help a church thrive. This source will be very useful since it has lots of data to show

social media's effect on a church. The source did not change my opinion on the topic but

it did support it. It is on par with my other sources as far as usefulness and relevance.

McSwain, Dr. Steve. “Why Nobody Wants to Go to Church Anymore.” ​The Huffington

Post,​ TheHuffingtonPost.com, 23 Jan. 2014,

www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-mcswain/why-nobody-wants-to-go-to_b_4086016.html​.

March 11th 2019

This popular news article explores the seven changing trends that are impacting church

attendance in America. It starts off by calling out some other writers who believe the

church is not dying, it’s just in a transitional period. The author then tells those writers to

do their research, which is followed by a paragraph of data suggesting that the church is

on the decline in America. Thousands of churches close their doors every year and more

people are now religiously unaffiliated than ever before. The author then says, “despite

the decline churches will never truly die, but they must evolve.” Now it goes into the

seven trends killing the church. Only two of the trends deal with my topic, but they are

important. The first is misuse or even no use of modern technology. The author argues
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that with more and more people using the internet churches need to adapt and get online,

or get left behind. The second trend was the negative impact of technology. The author

talks about how some churches are trying way too hard to be relevant and new.

Traditional stained glass styled church buildings mixed with smoke machines, large

monitors, and casually dressed pastors is a mixture that has not gone so well. The

Huffington Post is not only a popular source, but a fairly reliable source. I am not quick

to trust any mainstream media, but this article seems to give good information with a lot

of opinionated information mixed in. Dr. Steve McSwain is a speaker, author, counselor

to congregations, interfaith ambassador, and spiritual teacher. His credentials validate his

opinion on this matter and should be taken seriously by church leaders and pastors. This

source is very valuable because it talks about the negatives of technology in the church

rather than the positives like my other sources. It did not change my opinion on the topic

but it did give me some good examples of when technology is a bad thing in the church. I

will use this in my final paper because it gives a different perspective than my other

sources and it has good data.

Moen, Debi. "Redemption Church."​ Projection, Lights & Staging News,​ vol. 18, no. 9,

2017, pp. 100-101​. ProQuest,​

https://librarylink.uncc.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.librarylink.uncc.edu/d

ocview/1951883069?accountid=14605​. accessed March 9th 2019

PLSN.com (Projection Lights and Staging News) is an online news website that focuses

on news relating to stage design updates and the latest technology in projection lights and
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staging. I found this source through an article that talked about Redemption Churches

new stage design and technology in great detail. They use this new technology to allow

their broadcast to be more accessible on mobile devices and to run much more smoothly.

The article had an in-depth analysis of the process of installing the new system and what

each machine did to help the church spread the gospel. Once everything was installed the

church began testing the new stage and camera setup in rehearsals. The tests were a

success and the church staff says they are excited to start using the new equipment on

Sundays. It ended with statements from the pastor, Rob Carpenter, saying why he and the

church chose to install the expensive equipment. This website has many articles about

any new installation of high tech stage equipment, so they have many articles about

churches installing new technology. The website looks and runs very professionally and

has lots of great information on stage technology I find this source to be very reliable and

unbiased. PLSN never throws its opinion in the mix because the articles they make have

no need for opinions. Their content is pretty straightforward, it's just an in depth analysis

of staging and broadcasting technology. They focus on the tech, not the people who use

it. The intended audience is people who work in stage production, so their audience is

very specific. Overall, this website is a useful and unbiased place to get good information

for my project. It has not changed my opinion on the topic at all but it has shown me how

much effort goes into stage and broadcast technology for churches. This source will

appear in my final paper because it has articles with interviews of pastors explaining why

they decided to install the expensive equipment.