🔗 Link Post: Facebook’s Next Target: The Religious Experience
Facebook Wants You to Connect With God. On Facebook.
I was going to write about this, but decided to make it a link post instead. The reason: I’m not a fan of either Facebook or religion.
Elizabeth Dias, writing for the New York Times:
Facebook, which recently passed $1 trillion in market capitalization, may seem like an unusual partner for a church whose primary goal is to share the message of Jesus. But the company has been cultivating partnerships with a wide range of faith communities over the past few years, from individual congregations to large denominations, like the Assemblies of God and the Church of God in Christ.
Now, after the coronavirus pandemic pushed religious groups to explore new ways to operate, Facebook sees even greater strategic opportunity to draw highly engaged users onto its platform. The company aims to become the virtual home for religious community, and wants churches, mosques, synagogues and others to embed their religious life into its platform, from hosting worship services and socializing more casually to soliciting money. It is developing new products, including audio and prayer sharing, aimed at faith groups.
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Facebook is shaping the future of religious experience itself, as it has done for political and social life.
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The company’s effort to court faith groups comes as it is trying to repair its image among Americans who have lost confidence in the platform, especially on issues of privacy. Facebook has faced scrutiny for its role in the country’s growing disinformation crisis and breakdown of societal trust, especially around politics, and regulators have grown concerned about its outsize power
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The collaborations raise not only practical questions, but also philosophical and moral ones. Religion has long been a fundamental way humans have formed community, and now social media companies are stepping into that role.
There are privacy worries too, as people share some of their most intimate life details with their spiritual communities. The potential for Facebook to gather valuable user information creates “enormous” concerns, said Sarah Lane Ritchie, a lecturer in theology and science at the University of Edinburgh. The goals of businesses and worshiping communities are different, she said, and many congregations, often with older members, may not understand how they could be targeted with advertising or other messages based on their religious engagement.
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A Facebook spokeswoman said the data it collected from religious communities would be handled the same way as that of other users
It seems like a bad move for churches to hitch their wagon to Facebook. Facebook’s history gives us some insight as to how this may eventually turn out for churches.
Additional reading: America is losing its religion
