Ethos

Institute

#FAITH: SOCIAL MEDIA AND

THE CHURCH

#FAITH: SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE

CHURCH
A Monograph by

Ang Peng Hwa

&
Pauline Hope Cheong

Ethos Institute for Public Christianity

Copyright The Bible Society of Singapore 2016

Published by Sower Publishing Centre
(A ministry of The Bible Society of Singapore)
7 Armenian Street, Bible House
Singapore 179932
Tel: (65) 6337 3222
Email: info@bible.org.sg
www.bible.org.sg

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system
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copyright owner.
Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from The Holy Bible, New
International Version NIV Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica,
Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Printed in Singapore
ISBN: 978-981-220-539-1
978-981-220-547-6 (eBook)
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Bible Society is a trademark registered with the Intellectual Property Ofce of
Singapore.

CONTENTS

About Ethos Institute

vii

Ethos Institute Engagement Series

viii

Executive Summary

ix

Author Notes

xi

Introduction

Section A

Section B

Section C

Section D

Social Media Now and Then

Publish and Parish: Religious Authority,

Representation and Branding

Ecclesiastical Worship in Times of Digital

Mediation and Media Spectacles

15

Spiritual Community and Connectivity

in Times of Intensified Mediations

21

Piety, Solitude, the Spiritual Disciplines

and Social Media

27

Final Thoughts: Social Media, Social Church

31

References

35

About
Ethos
Institute

ABOUT ETHOS INSTITUTE

thos Institute for Public Christianity was formed by National

Council of Churches in Singapore, Trinity Theological College
and The Bible Society of Singapore in 2014. Ethos Institute seeks
to serve church and society by engaging contemporary issues and
trends from the Christian perspective. Ethos Institute offers:

Studies on important topics and issues from the Christian

perspective
Regular lectures, seminars, conferences and symposiums
for the Christian public
Resources to Churches and Christians in different
professions and vocations
Resources to the National Council of Churches in Singapore

Contact:
7 Armenian Street, Bible House, #03-08 Singapore 179932
Tel: (65) 6304 3765 Fax: (65) 6337 3036
Email: info@ethosinstitute.sg
www.ethosinstitute.sg
vii

Engagement
Series

ETHOS INSTITUTE ENGAGEMENT SERIES

Series Editor: Roland Chia

he Ethos Institute Engagement Series aims to address pertinent

issues in church and society from the biblical and Christian
perspectives. Authored by theologians and scholars in different
fields, this booklet series discusses a variety of topics including
theology, politics, economics, education, science and the arts. The
booklets are an important resource not only for pastors and leaders
of the church, but also for Christians who wish to reflect more deeply
on the most important and pressing issues of today.

viii

Summary

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

#Faith: Social Media and the Church provides a pathway for

understanding our interaction with one of the latest media
innovations today. This monograph is not intended as a how to
manual. It is more a why and what are the implications booklet.
It begins with a historical perspective by recounting the role
the then new social media of epistles and letters has played in
growing the early church from the time of the Apostles to Martin
Luther.
Following that, it discusses the implications of Internet-based
social media for the church, including aspects of its authority,
worship, community and identity.
The monograph points out the short-term effects and longer
term implications of using social media for extending the church. It
also highlights the need for a social media Sabbath where one takes
a break from digitally connected gadgets like the smartphone.
The monograph concludes that social media is suited to the
social church, but its uses are not without challenges and tensions.
The adoption of the latest media including Internet-based social
media can benefit the church, and help reach the young. However,
as social beings, our need for perpetual connection need not solely
be slaked by a compulsive social media diet.

ix

About
Authors

AUTHOR NOTES

Ang Peng Hwa is Professor at the Wee Kim Wee School of

Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological
University. He researches media law and policy and is the author
of Ordering Chaos: Regulating the Internet. He co-founded the
Global Internet Governance Academic Network and the AsiaPacific Regional Internet Governance Forum, serving as inaugural
chairs for both. He is a vice-president of the Consumers Association
of Singapore where he also serves as the legal advisor of the
Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore. In 2015, he was
elected President of the International Communication Association.
Pauline Hope Cheong is Associate Professor at the Hugh Downs
School of Human Communication, Arizona State University.
She studies the complex interactions between communication
technologies and different cultural communities around the world,
including changing religious authority and community practices.
Dr. Cheong has published more than 65 articles and books and
has served as lead editor of Digital Religion, Social Media and
Culture: Perspectives, Practices, Futures (2012). She is an alumna of
Nanyang Technological University and the University of Southern
California. Her work has been honoured with top research paper
and book awards by the National Communication Association and
International Communication Association.

xi

Intro

INTRODUCTION

e are social beings. We want and in fact need to communicate

with each other. This need to communicate is fundamental in
shaping our identity, who we are and who we like to let others see
who we are. We may like to think we are self-made, in the sense
that it is we ourselves who determine who we are. In reality, who
we are depends on the constituting others. That is, we are what
people reflect to uswe are reflections and images. We know who
we are through our communication. It is thus supremely ironic that
solitary confinementwhen we are left with only ourselveshas
been called the cruellest punishment. In contemporary times, such
communication is no longer just expressed through face-to-face or
even the phone conversation but also through the media, both as
content and as platform. As content, we want to know the news.
We also want to know what others consider newsworthy, that is
important enough that we should know, care and share.
Indeed, research in places and times as diverse as New York in
19541 and Nepal in 20052 has found that being informed of the news
is such a part of our daily lives that when we go without it, we feel
anxious. In Nepal, where all forms of electronic communication
fax, fixed line and mobile phone, and Internetwere cut off for up
to 88 days in a security operation in 2005, people began talking to
strangers on the streets to exchange news. The home of one of the
editors of a newspaper became a news hub with people dropping
by to get news. Yet where picking up and reading the hardcopy
newspaper first thing in the morning was the norm, turning on the
smartphone to read new posts is increasingly becoming the norm
for many these days.
Equally significant in impact is the use of media as a platform.
That is, the use of media as a means of communication is becoming
more important and having a greater impact. Our reliance on such
1

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CHURCH

tools of mediated communication is so much taken for granted that

it is only when they are absent that we realise our dependency.
Today, with our use of the mobile phone to communicate on the
go for business and personal purposes, the dependency is even
greater. In Nepal in 2005, when the widely used prepaid mobile
phone service was restored, 4,000 people queued up from 4 a.m. for
2,000 mobile-sim cards.
For most of those queueing, the desire for communication was
commercially motivated. But in our personal lives, we can attest
to the value of having a mobile phone. We use it to coordinate our
daily lives, a phenomenon called hyper coordination or microcoordination.3 Perhaps the best evidence of the utility of modern
communication into our lives is the fact that the invention most
quickly adopted globally is the mobile phone, particularly the smart
phone with built-in computing power.4

Now
&
Then

SOCIAL MEDIA NOW AND THEN

n the Internet, social media sites, where users connect to

other users yet have public communication or mass self
communication1, are among the most frequented sites. Probably
the most cited definition of social media is that given by the early
researchers danah boyd and Nicole Ellison.2 They defined social
media sites as services that have three functions: 1) allowing users
to build a profile within a system, 2) allowing users to list their users
and 3) to connect with their own list as well as the lists of others. A
key part of the definition is that social media are the applications
that allow users to share content (the media part) and to form a
social network (the social part). That is, it is not enough to simply
post content for others to view and react. There should be some form
of networking among the users.
An example of a prominent social media site is Facebook,
with more than 1 billion users worldwide. In the business world,
LinkedIn is the social media site for working professionals. These
sites allow strangers to approach or be invited to join a group. Such
sites make it easier to mobilise resources. These days, the definition
of social media has broadened to encompass messaging services
such as WhatsApp, WeChat and QQ. These messaging services are
closed groups; one has to be invited. But they share the property of
being a powerful tool to share content and organise groups.
At least one author has argued that analogue versions of social
3

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CHURCH

media have always existed. Graffiti on the wall are the equivalent
of wall posts on social media. Letters in Roman times were semipublic; because of low literacy, the letters were often read aloud,
circulated much along the lines of the epistles in the New Testament.
Pauls letters were written to be read. He told the Thessalonians:
I charge you before the Lord to have this letter read to all the
brothers and sisters.3 The modern churchs reading of Pauls letters
in the worship service continues this tradition. The social media
equivalent would be posting the letter and having it go viral.
Indeed, it has been argued that [a]lthough Christians are
sometimes described as people of the book, the early church might
be more accurately described as a community of letter-sharers.4
The letters from the Apostles were intended to be copied and passed
on. Because the Roman Empire made it relatively safe and fast
to travel, messengers, messages and ideas could move between
cities rather efficiently. In fact, Paul appeared to have chosen for
extended stays cities such as Ephesus and Corinth that could be
considered as trade and communication hubs. Such cities made it
easier to send and receive letters. Second Corinthians was written
to the church of God in Corinth, together with all his holy people
throughout Achaia5 and Galatians to the churches in Galatia6;
Peter addressed his first letter to exiles throughout Asia Minor.7
Being located in a hub, however, was not enough in itself to
spread the gospel quickly. It would require a combination of greater
literacy on the part of the public as well as technological innovation
to lower the cost of printing in order for documents to go viral.
Until the invention of the metal-type printing press, letters and
documents were costly to produce. Whoever wanted to reproduce
written material had to pay a scribe. The high cost in turn meant
that only the rich could afford books. The library at the University
of Cambridge in 1424, nearly two decades before the printing press
would be invented, had just 122 volumes.8 This meant that literacy
was low, which also meant that the cost of educating a scribe would
have been high.
The advent of the printing press heralded many technological
and social changes. With the printing press, the cost of printed
material plummeted. The cost of education was lowered and there
was an increase in literacy as reading material became more easily
available.
On hindsight, there is no question that the printing press was a
highly disruptive technology. It plucked the Bible from the exclusive

Social Media Now and Then

realm of the clergy and placed it in the hands of the public. It was
this groundswell from the public reading the Bible for themselves
that also helped Martin Luther when he drew up his 95 Theses.
Originally written in Latin, the 95 Theses first spread among
the scholars of the Catholic Church in traditional hand-copied form.
But it soon began to appear in printed editions as pamphlets and
broadsheets. The speed at which the newly-invented printing press
was spreading his Theses surprised even Luther. Realising that
people were interested to read it, he translated the text into simple
German, ensuring that there were no regional vocabulary 9 that
could be misunderstood. (This is an illustration of how the medium
affects how we write. It parallels the current concern about how our
young people are shortening words to text to each other.)
Part of the reason for the rapid spread of printed material was
that the printing press changed the economics of publishing. Unlike
hand-copied manuscripts where the author had to pay a scribe to
produce copies, all that Luther had to do to spread his 95 Theses
was to hand them to a printer, who would then produce hundreds
if not thousands of the Theses in pamphlet form and sell them.
There was minimal cost to the author. And the printer could print
according to demand. Further, because literacy was low, buying
printed material was status-conferring; and some who were semiliterate bought copies in support of Luther and also to gain status.10
Meanwhile, there were other Church scholars who wrote
to criticise Luther. To do so, they reproduced his Theses, thereby
disseminating it further. In fact, some quarters in the Church
withheld criticising Luther for fear of publicising his radical views.11
The criticisms hardened Luthers position and he became even
more critical of the Church. Pope Leo in 1520, three years after
Luther had published his Theses, issued a decree (called a Papal
Bull) threatening to excommunicate Luther and his followers. The
wider availability of printed material, however, had changed society.
People were reading and discussing Luthers Theses now printed in
pamphlet form in the workplace and in taverns. Instead of arresting
Luther and turning him over to the Church, scholars, students and
large swathes of the public supported him. Such support emboldened
Luther sufficiently to conduct a public ceremony in one city to burn
the Papal Bull.
The use of the printing press for the education of a more literate
and questioning public had facilitated the decline of the authority
of the Catholic Church in the European context. Was thisthe

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CHURCH

undermining of authoritywhy the Chinese, who invented the

printing press centuries ahead of Gutenberg, limited the use of the
printing press to official documents and religious texts? One can
only speculate.
In many ways, the church tends to be conservative in the use
of newer communication technologies. A 2011 survey in Canada by
Tyndale Seminary found that 21 percent of churches in the province
of Ontario, Canada, discouraged even the reading of the Bible on
electronic devices. However, as we will discuss in the following
sections, many churches have overcome the initial inertia and
reluctance to engage social media. In fact in a few cases, churches
are the incubators of social media innovation.

Conclusion
We are communicators. As social beings, we have always
appropriated different media for news gathering and social
networking. In the history of the church, adoption of new media has
included the practice of letter writing as a socially shared way of
communicating among believers. The epistles were letters written
to be read aloud in public, and then copied and passed on to ones
social networks.
It took 70 years for the printing press to shake the foundations
of first the German church and then German society. Yes, there
were other factors beyond the technology of the printing press at
play. But however one looks at it, the dissemination of the 95 Theses
by Martin Luther was a critical factor.
Today, the communication services that ride on the Internet
are at an infancy stage still. The multi-billion dollar Internet
companies such as Google and Facebook were started less than 20
years ago. In human years, they would not be considered mature
adults yet.
And so our understanding of the impact of social media is
similarly at an infancy. There is much that history can inform us.
But no two paradigm-changing technologies are exactly the same.
And so we are tentative in suggesting possible outcomes and even
manner of use.
But of no doubt is that religious groups will and should use
the new communication technologies afforded us. The very people
that the church wants to reach are using these communication
technologies.

Section
A

PUBLISH AND PARISH: RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY,

REPRESENTATION AND BRANDING

Introduction

n recent years, in light of new digital media developments, the

notion of authority has seemingly taken a beating. Buzzwords
like the Facebook Revolution, Web 2.0 or Twitter uprisings have
surfaced. These terms signal a radical rupture and change in
society, accompanied by an erosion of existing hierarchies and
institutions, including the church and its leadership. So, this brings
up the question: Does social media use necessarily erode religious
authority?
Indeed, changes in communication technologies have had
profound implications for religious authority. Clergy have
been characterised as threatened by secularisation, religious
privatisation1, and deprofessionalisation alongside increased lay
scepticism of theological expertise.2 But as we will show in this
section, there are countervailing forces, pressures and relationships
that enable clergy to restructure, restore and even augment their
authority.3,4

Digital Media and Religious Authority

Popular understanding of communication technologies and
authority, suggests that technological developments tend to weaken,
alter or even destroy traditional authority structures. For example,
7

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CHURCH

there are expectations that online information seeking and digital

media networks will change the access to and flows of information,
previously controlled by elites and scholars.
In the context of religion, digital media use may diminish the
perceived stock of knowledge held by clergy as an increasing corpus
of religious texts is now searchable online. Sacred scriptures and
relevant interpretations may be found on sites like Biblegateway.
com, which are hyperlinked to multiple commentaries in different
languages. Religious content like sermons and devotionals are
circulated on Listserv, YouTube videos, podcasts and webcasts of
church services.
As of July 2015, the worlds largest free mobile Bible app,
YOUversion allows mobile phone and tablet users to access
and study Scripture in numerous ways, including more than 800
reading plans, quick searches of particular words and verbs, a
private journal, favorite verse bookmarks and the ability to view
and share insights and verses with others on Twitter and by email.
YOUversion has been downloaded more than 180 million times
and the app is available in 1092 versions and 780 languages. This
unprecedented accessibility to religious information available to
those living in mediated societies may decentre seminaries and
churches as sites of theology since lay persons can assemble and
customise religious guides online to suit their own preferences and
inclinations.
In addition, online interactivity may erode authority by
allowing those traditionally lower on the ladder of hierarchy to
initiate interactions with others and those of higher status. The rise
of new online experts including religious bloggers5 and contact
us opportunities on search portals, have increased channels for
religious believers and seekers to communicate. For example, lay
persons can initiate questions and counselling conversations, start
debates, and even confront clergy with the information that they
have obtained online. This change in relational and informational
access has prompted some to believe that the authority of religious
leaders has eroded. This is because some followers have developed
critical attitudes and entertained doubts about traditional doctrines
from electronic forum interactions.6 New virtual communities of selfproclaimed experts and intermediate interpreters have emerged.7
It is significant to note, however, how a key paradox in
religious authority relations is its enervation and centralisation
of control.8 Increased contact to religious interpretations and

Publish and Parish: Religious Authority, Representation and Branding

personalities online provide followers with alternative resources to

challenge traditional teachings and disrupt hierarchies. Yet these
same online resources may be appropriated by clergy to serve as a
source of education for themselves and their laity. The credibility of
clergy is simultaneously enhanced when they move beyond pulpit
and top-down instruction to personal and mediated mentorship
practices, including the publication and dissemination of their own
religious materials.9

Religious Authority as Mediated and Non-mediated

Communication
Religious authority is traditionally understood to arise from sacred
tradition, appointment to a superior office and perceived charisma
of being instilled with divine or supernatural powers. However,
authority can also be understood in more relational and emergent
terms, where authority is co-created and maintained in dynamic
interactions between leaders and followers that acknowledge and
conversationally manifest the asymmetrical and consequential
nature of their relationship. In other words, religious authority
could be treated as an order and quality of communication. As
such, contemporary religious authority is embedded in everyday
interactions. Depending on the context, its performance not only
involves but also often depends on the appropriation of media.10
This implies that communication technologies use is not wholly
incompatible with religious leadership, particularly in highly wired
societies like Singapore. For clergy to restructure and even enhance
their authority, it becomes increasingly crucial for some not to
eschew new communication technologies but to engage newer forms
of media thoughtfully.

Mediating Religious Authority: Research evidence and

examples
Recent research on Singaporean clergy has shown that maintaining
communicative influence through both offline and online
engagement restores trust and in turn, increases congregational
members dependence and dedication to church leadership. For
instance, Kluver & Cheong11, in addressing questions of religion
and modernisation in Singapore, found complementarity in the
relationship between many clergy perceptions and practices, and
Internet applications. This study of religious leaders from a variety

10

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CHURCH

of established faith traditions (i.e. Buddhist, Christian, Muslim,

Taoist and Hindu) found that instead of incongruence and criticism
of new technology, religious leaders largely framed the Internet
as a positive development for their community and embraced the
Internet as part of their religious missions and growth strategy.
Findings from another study of Singaporean Christian
pastors showed how various leaders of multiple denominations
restructured their work in light of rising digital and social media
use and expectations among their congregants.12 Christian
leaders incorporated online resources to inform and inspire their
sermons, and used visuals and video material to boost their pulpit
communication. To stem the loss of control and overwork from their
increasing communicative load, leaders carefully monitored their
online communication (e.g. by redirecting or selectively curbing
email response). Some pastors dealt with the increasing onslaught
of online inquiries by maintaining their right to delay or respond
to these demands by insisting that they need time to pray over
certain issues.
Furthermore, many Singaporean pastors practised strategic
arbitration of competing texts. They justified the validity of their
authority by drawing upon scriptural authority to support their
own interpretations and teachings, in order to reinforce normative
regulation and trust in religious leadership.13 Indeed church
members are not always discouraged from exploring competing
sources of expertise on the Internet. But leaders reported to exert
their influence to retain or dispose of such expertise on the basis
of their competence. Some do so by embarking on a new online
ministry where they deliberately engaged in personal dialogue
and debate with their members and seekers online. Several
leaders also pointed out the need for branding trust. Drawing
from lessons from corporate organisations, they have constructed
original content to build their church brands as a distinct and
recognisable organisational voice on cyberspace in the religious
marketplace of ideas. They said they promoted their voice online
with the publication of blogs, newsletters and e-votionals (electronic
devotionals) to strengthen congregational affective interest and
organisational loyalty.
These communicative efforts by some Singaporean pastors
are in line with recent literature related to church promotion and
spiritual brandversations.14 In particular, it has been recognised
that the marketing of churches involves a process of storytelling

Publish and Parish: Religious Authority, Representation and Branding

11

whereby successful churches self-consciously use commercial

narrative techniques to make their ideological points and distribute
their services to generate cultural capital.15 Several commentators,
including church consultant James Cooke in Branding Faith16,
have even recommended that the construction of the branded
pastor-preneur is essential for the development of fundraising
and collaborations to augment church resources, given the public
pressures on the spiritual head who, in turn, must project a
distinctive and appealing persona.
Hence, in light of burgeoning media publication and publicity,
some pastors of megachurches in America have been labelled as
celebrities17 and holy mavericks.18 More recently, this form of
digital media publicity to fuel what might be termed a culture of
religious celebrification19 has arguably extended from the West to
various prominent leaders of mega-churches in Singapore. These
religious organisations have increased in number and influence in
the last decade and have developed multi-sited campuses in Asia
and abroad, supported by extensive old and new media pathways of
communication across traditional broadcast, print, radio and digital
media.20 These pathways include the latest social media, like Twitter
and other microblogging tools that provide clerics a platform for
real-time information sharing with its interface for short written
texts (140 characters), which can provide links to graphics and
sound recordings that can be forwarded and responded to by others.
It is therefore interesting to observe how various Singaporean
pastors have adopted tweet authorship in tandem with other older
media, to further their ministry. A recent analysis of a Twitter feed
by a prominent Singaporean Christian megachurch leader with
global influence in Asia, Australia and the United States, identified
multiple ways in which tweets have been composed to boost pastoral
epistemic authority. Religious tweets have been utilised to quote,
remix and interpret Scripture, and serve as choice aphorisms that
reflect or are inspired by Scripture.21
For example, tweets have been authored to quote Scripture,
in verbatim or by blending scriptural texts with tagged pictures for
illustration. Instances of scriptural remix have also been employed
where Chinese proverbs are paired with English Holy Scripture
during the Chinese Lunar New Year season, to make connections
between Chinese idiomatic expressions and Biblical texts concerning
mental and material prosperity. Certain parts of a tweet have also
been capitalised to reflect the pastors interpretation of Scripture.

12

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CHURCH

Writing in CAPS highlights how attention is drawn to the certain

parts or specific phases in Bible verses and reminds followers of
exactly where their focus on the verse should be. In yet another
example, actual Biblical texts appear to take a back seat in social
media communiqus. Prescriptive messages like mini sermonettes
are sent, with only a reference and little incorporation of Scripture,
rendering a unique spiritual lesson or personal instruction for the
Pastors followers.
Thus, in the above ways, tweets can work in concert with
the larger communication and digital media landscape, to sustain
pastoral legitimacy and organisational hierarchy. Within a culture
of religious celebrification, clergy tweeting helps in the continuous
authoring of their authority, to articulate a preferred self and
personal brand.22

Conclusion
The above discussion highlights the potential for clergy fruitfulness
and productivity in an era of digital and social media networks.
Religious leaders may strategically incorporate and connect to
communication technologies to deepen their instruction and extend
their teachings to a wider audience. Historically, the evangelistic
impulse of the Christian faith has prompted believers to spread
the word in creative, terse and colloquial ways. For example, the
distribution of brief publications or relatively low cost tracts
were produced to spur spiritual growth during the 19th century
Evangelical revivalist movement.23 Similarly, pastors today may
also conduct new online ministries and social media outreach to
followers and seekers of the faith.
Yet, the potential for perversion in religious authority also
exists. For example, online communication and the construction of
a carefully crafted and necessarily condensed version of a pastors
brand identity is not without ambivalence and tensions.24 Clergy
branding often involves frequent status updates and a public
sharing of their activities, whereabouts, even personal petitions and
prayers. However, it is arguable that Scripture dictates that some
acts of piety and generosity should be kept private, to glorify God and
not to elicit attention to self or public commendation (e.g. Matthew
6:1-4). Therefore, contrary to the marketing discourse that advise
pastors to simply post a tweet, it may be difficult for clergy to
discern the appropriateness of their Facebook status updates, online

Publish and Parish: Religious Authority, Representation and Branding

13

confessions, and public shout-outs, in light of Scripture-inspired

injunctions, to maintain a humble profile, even secretive service.
A related challenge is the authenticity of information presented
online, as glossy websites and crafted messages may not accurately
represent the identity of a pastor or church culture.
The pressures to over-communicate on multiple media
platforms may also be overwhelming for religious leaders,
who are already burdened with a plethora of work and family
responsibilities. A tethered digital existence is not without social
and personal costs. An immense amount of communicative labour
is required of religious leadership to meet the rising expectations of
their hyperconnected congregational members who are constantly
on social media and seeking new updates and bytes.
Furthermore, religious leaders are not exempt from malevolent
behaviours and unhealthy competition arising from self-conscious
social media updates. It is not uncommon to feel jealous and covetous
with social media use, as people compare status updates and make
snap judgments from online media personas. Recent research has
shown that Facebook envy and social comparisons are related to
increased psychological distress, reduced self-esteem and skewed
beliefs about others and their well-being.25,26 Related to this point,
it is significant to note that prior research among Singaporean
pastors have revealed how leaders of smaller organisations with
less administrative support and financial resources feel that they
face more severe threats to their survival and are subject to more
scrutiny and comparison. This is especially in instances when
members compare their pedagogy with online materials, podcasts
and vodcasts available on websites of larger and mega churches,
both locally and worldwide.27 Recognition of these pressures and
perversions highlights the tension of how much clergy can and
should be connecting on digital and social media.