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That’s just the tip of the iceberg. The average American Facebook user spends about twelve minutes a day checking in on her Facebook news feed, updating her status, and “liking” or commenting on friends’ statuses. Slight though this may seem, it adds up to more than five hours a month on Facebook alone.³ Users in Israel and Russia spend twice that amount of time, clocking more than ten hours a month on Facebook.⁴

There’s more! By summer’s end, while you were relaxing in your hammock, the Jesus Daily Facebook page was ranked the number one “most engaging” page, trouncing teen heartthrob Justin Bieber and soccer powerhouse Manchester United.⁵ The Jesus Daily page was hardly alone at the top as a marker of the religious interests of Facebook Nation. Also in the top twenty were pages for the Bible, Jesus Christ (one of many), “Dios Es Bueno!,” “I’m a Muslim & Proud!,” and Joyce Meyer Ministries. Eleven of these came in ahead of Barack Obama and glam-pop megastar Lady Gaga.

Importantly, the “most engaging” ratings are not based just on the number of members a Facebook page has—Bieber and Gaga are well ahead in terms of raw numbers. Rather, the ranking takes into account the number of interactions on the page, including posts, comments on posts, and likes. What has pulled religion-oriented pages to the top is not, then, that people of faith are interested only in displaying their faith, but that they also want to talk about it with others.

This engagement factor highlights a key aspect of digital ministry that we noted in the introduction and that bears repeating here: ministry in the Digital Reformation—not only in digital locales but also in local spaces in which interaction is increasingly shaped by digital practice—is networked and relational rather than broadcast and numerical. It’s about how you connect in meaningful, personal ways with people across diverse networks, not about how many people hear your message. It is here that, we feel strongly, approaches to ministry online based on commercial marketing strategies are bound to fail miserably in the long run. People don’t want to buy what you’re selling. They want to know who you are.

Before we move on to learn more about who all these religiously engaged social media participants are, take a moment to consider this: What would it mean to your church or other faith organization to have an active cohort of people who, even for five minutes a day, were interested in gathering to pray, comment on scripture, discuss the needs of the world in light of their faith? If those folks were willing to gather outside your doors, would you be willing, as a ministry leader, to take time to encourage them and help to enrich their time together?

Well, these folks might not be outside your office door, but they are certainly right outside your digital door, on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and more. Indeed, the Pew Internet & American Life Project reports that a full 65 percent of American adults who use the Internet are members of Facebook, MySpace, or LinkedIn— participation that has doubled since 2008 and is increasing at a rate of about 10 percent per year.

LIKING

“Liking” on Facebook is when you click the word “like” under a post, photo, or video. This causes a teeny thumbs up icon to appear below the post:

“Liking” is a quick way to show you’re paying attention, give a nod of approval, or just say “hello” on someone else’s Facebook wall. It makes minimal, but often meaningful, engagement possible within your Facebook community.

See Chapter 3 for more on using Facebook in digital ministry.