Mormons Online: Elder M. Russell Ballard
On December 15 of this year Elder M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon Church) gave a speech at Brigham Young University-Hawaii’s graduation ceremony about the use of New Media to support the work of the Church.
I am really glad that Elder Ballard gave such a talk. I work for the More Good Foundation, and we are concerned abaout and committed to spread good information about the Church online. We want to make sure – using Elder Ballard’s words – that we “define the message of the Restoration rather than letting others define our beliefs.”
Elder Ballard explains,
Now all of you know that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are reminded and encouraged continually to share the gospel with others. The Church is always looking for the most effective ways to declare our message.
For some unfortunate reason, until recently there was a prevalent feeling among members of the Church that we were not supposed to use the Internet to talk about our beliefs. The problem with this attitude is that if we do not define who we are and in what we believe, others will do it;Â and they will do it without enough knowledge or even with malicious intent.
Elder Ballard’s talk is very welcomed, because it explains clearly why members need to be involved online. He draws an interesting parallel between the invention of the press and the Internet:
There are perhaps few inventions that have had a greater impact on the world than the printing press, invented by the inspired Johannes Gutenberg in 1436. The printing press enabled knowledge, including the Holy Bible, to be shared more widely than ever before. Ultimately, the common people had access to the truths of scripture, and the clergy no longer held the populace hostage to their interpretations.
He continues:
Today we have a modern equivalent of the printing press in the Internet and all that it means. The Internet allows everyone to be a publisher, to have their voice heard, and it is revolutionizing society. Before the Internet, there were great barriers to printing. It took money, power, or influence and a great amount of time to publish. But today, because of the emergence of what some call New Media, made possible by the Internet, many of those barriers have been removed.
This is really amazing. The Lord has found a way to spread the gospel to billions of people, bypassing the usual barriers created by the lack of money or power. We need to use this window of opportunity as fast as we can because there is always the possibility for new barriers to emerge, limiting the freedom allowed by the Internet.
In the meantime there are a few simple things that almost any member can do. For example, a blog:
A Church member living in the Midwest makes a concerted effort to share the gospel everyday, in person. He then writes a blog about his daily endeavors to share the teachings of the Book of Mormon and to give pass-along cards to all he meets.
Or we can share our conversion stories and other uplifting experiences:
Others have recorded and posted their testimonies of the Restoration, the teachings of the Book of Mormon, and other gospel subjects on popular video-sharing sites.
We (the More Good Foundation) have created a website where we invite people to share their stories at MormonTestimonies. We would like to have thousand of members sharing their stories online.
I am really grateful to Elder Ballard for his speech that explains the principles behind our need to use the Internet to do good or even. . .more good!
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Link to the full article: Using New Media to Support the Work of the Church
Comments
2 Responses to Mormons Online: Elder M. Russell Ballard
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Missionary work: the Mormon way | Giuseppe Martinengo on
Thu, 4th Dec 2008 2:58 pm
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Mormon Online Missions | GMormon (Giuseppe Martinengo) on
Fri, 28th Aug 2009 4:29 pm
[...] was a great day for the missionary work in the Church when, a little less than a year ago, Elder Ballard gave his first speech about online missionary work at the graduation ceremony at [...]
[...] if we as member of the Church learn to use the Internet as suggested by Elder Ballard we will see a great improvement in positive and successfull member-missionary work, and more true [...]