The No-Church-Building Church is Growing

The concept of a life with fewer and fewer face-to-face encounters seems the future in so many ways. It is universities and marketplaces. Now, churches without buildings are growing. Certainly, churches with both buildings and online gatherings will remain for a while. Inevitable, however, is the "church" where people never physically meet each other.

Several of these churches are discussed in the link. It seems hard to generalize about whether these on-line groups are more conservative or more liberal. There is some of each. Most common are those without a denomination to establish the core beliefs--these may morph around a lot.

One interesting aspect of this which is discussed in the link is the question of who "owns" the church. The infrastructure is owned by the likes of Face Book. Perhaps Amazon will offer a church. Making money is the goal of whatever company provides the internet to believers. It is not the same as a group of like-minded people putting up a building and hiring a preacher, but it is not all that different either. Both the old model of a sticks and bricks church and a virtual church need to pay for their space. As a side note, there are virtual baptisms so the expensive total emersion baptism facilities of a church building are no longer needed. 

From an economics perspective, the virtual church will increase competition because what we call in economics, "barriers to entry," are lower. Churches can form and dissolve easily and quickly. This should bring new religious ideas into the mix to compete with old ideas. The link mentioned an online church which recites the Apostle's Creed. The Creed, however, has been modified to fit what the group wants it to say. I didn't look up the modernized Creed but readers can find links to it in the link above.

Another innovation is the concert-style service, much contemporary music and lite preaching. I gather it has grown rapidly. 

It seems to me all the great religions of our time are competing against a return to Paganism, or something like it. Paganism is a religion with many gods, each with a location and a local reason to exist. The internet is paving the way.