Skip to main content

New PCNSW website

Check out the new website of the NSW Presbyterians! Actually, it's been up since July - I just haven't noticed... (*shame*)
The site looks good - plenty of pictures, nice colours - and it's easy to navigate - simple, clear menus. But it seems more a portal into the Presbyterian denomination, rather than a mission resource. For example: at the home page, there's a button "for visitors" - that's good - but it takes you to a page with more info about the Presbyterian church. There's no overt evangelism. That's a pity.
The Sydney Anglican website is much more of a mission resource. There's always something there that could feed into evangelism, preaching, prayer... whatever. Although there's no overt evangelism there, either - only a very small button at the top right, "Christianity".
This isn't a big problem for the PCNSW site. All it needs is another button on the home page, with something like "What does it mean to follow Jesus", that links to some evangelistic material. Two Ways to Live would be as good as any - it's already in the links section. Or Christianity.net.au. And under the "resources" menu, creating a section for "mission, evangelism and church-planting", with links to stuff like Christianity Explained, Introducing God, the Acts 29 church planting network, and the Church Planting Village.
Any other suggestions, anyone?

Comments

Anonymous said…
Thanks for those comments Kamal. All good stuff. The re-building of the site was overdue. Having got it to this stage it was hacked into and we have now just got it up again better protected. When we are convinced the foundation has a robust base, we will want to do all the things you mentioned - and more!
Wayne Richards, General Manager

Popular posts from this blog

The different distractions of secularity and spirituality

There has been a lot of discussion about the recent 'vibe shift' away from radical atheism back towards an openness to the supernatural. I don't think this new spirituality is necessarily an openness to the unique claims of Christ. It will more probably replace one set of commonly-accepted misunderstandings about Jesus with another.  Under radical atheism, people dismissed the Biblical claims about Jesus' resurrection because they 'knew' that it was impossible. Jesus hadn't really died. He just passed out (after being beaten and whipped and crucified) and then woke up in the tomb (and rolled away the stone himself and overcame several guards). Or the disciples hallucinated that they saw him (even though Jewish beliefs of the time didn't expect one person to rise possessing eternal life himself; they expected a general resurrection at the end of time - see John 11:24 ). Or something else.  The so-called 'explanations' of Jesus' non-resurrectio...

A better understanding of nonbelief

The Nones Project is an ongoing study into the belief systems of people who call themselves non-religious. A few weeks ago one of the project leaders,  Ryan Burge  of Washington University,  posted some really interesting preliminary results  on his Substack.  1. We've probably heard of people who are spiritual but not religious (SBNRs). SBNRs were "the largest group of nones" in the sample. They believe in the supernatural realm but not necessarily in "a God." They are "deeply skeptical of religion but highly interested in spirituality," therefore individualistic and anti-institutional.  2. But this study differentiated SBNRs from people they called Nones In Name Only, NiNos. They different to SBNRs by being religious about their spiritual. They believe not just in the supernatural but in "God." And they tend to engage in traditional communal religious practices while SBNRs practice individualised eclectic bespoke spiritual practices. The s...

Barfights in the public square

Everything in the public square seems to be increasingly conflicted. We seem to be operating with less and less shared values. It feels like we're less and less sure of what holds us together as a 'society.' A retreat into 'tribes' both drives this social fragmentation and is a result of it.  Post-modern scepticism towards metanarratives, which has now become culturally normal, significantly contributes to this fragmentation. If we no longer believe that objective truth, independent of our individual or tribal perspectives, exists, we will no longer believe we can appeal to that objective reality as common ground for debate. All we will do is exert power to magnify ourselves and punish those who disagree with us.  Because we believe that our cause is right, we will always think of ourselves as the victim of other people's aggression. Therefore, as Stephen McAlpine says, we will always think we're punching "up." We'll valorise ourselves as the ...