Twitter + Apologetics = Twittegetics

Whenever I think of Twitter, I think of David Crowder and a video he made. He makes a very convincing case (through the emotional manipulation of comedy) that Twitter is quite dangerous. Watch it here.

I disagree with his conclusion that Twitter will kill you. I've been using it for some time, and I am quite healthy and fine ;)

If you aren't familiar with what Twitter is, it is a social media site (social media: think Facebook and Myspace) where the form of communication are very short status updates. Unlike Facebook, where you can have long statuses and type an entire book in the comment box, Twitter limits you to only 140 characters per post. Unlike Facebook, where you have to send a friend request and they have to approve it in order to interact with someone, Twitter is an open community. You can "follow" someone (the Twitterlingo for becoming a "Friend" of that person") and see the updates they post. You can send links, tag people by using @, you can use # to start a trend or a conversation, and you can freely interact with anyone in Twitter without having to follow them. It is a very fun and wonderful service. Musicians, companies, news organizations, authors, actors, and more use Twitter to converse with subscribers, customers and fans. If you look in the right column on this blog, you will see my personal Twitter posts. Honestly, I enjoy Twitter just as much if not more than Facebook. It is very simple, very streamlined (unlike Facebook), and just a lot of fun. If you use Twitter, follow me at @EvangelancerAuz

With this kind of viral and open Twitter community comes the question of the role of apologetics. How does one use Twitter for apologetic conversations or in-depth dialogue when you are limited to 140 characters per post?

I ask this question because I had the opportunity to start a good dialogue with one of my Twitter followers about a post he made. In paraphrase, this follower said "Christianity, Islam, and Judaism are all the same: hate, war, and slaughter them all". Aside the fact that this is a blatant ad-hominem against many religions, this would have been a great chance to start a conversation about the validity of this claim. Using the skills from Tactics, I imagine this conversation to be a fruitful one where it could have been easy to demonstrate the incredibly absurdity of the claim. And yet I chose to chicken out and ignore it. Why? I didn't know how I could do this conversation with only 140 characters. If you use Twitter, you know how hard it can be to use less than 140 characters!

Apologetics and Facebook were just made for each other. I have regular conversations with a few of my atheist friends about religion and the like, and I can always say what I want/need to say knowing that I will have plenty of room. Indeed, apologetic conversations on Facebook are usually very productive because the fear of face-to-face conversation is diminished, and this applies to Twitter as well, but unlike Facebook, you have a limit on what you can say in Twitter.

A few months ago a Twitter user re-tweeted a post I made, and almost overnight I had a slew of critics slamming me for what I had said. It wasn't a controversial post, yet many choose to twist my words out of context. Knowing this was a good opportunity to plant seeds, I made an effort to reply to each and every one of them, usually extending a hand of friendship and compassion in spite of the comments they had made against me. A couple of users want to have a debate with me, which I gladly accepted, and I found myself juggling several conversations ranging from the historical existence of Jesus Christ to the nature of faith. It was impossible, until I discovered Twitlonger, a service that allows you to write massive Twitter posts. Twitlonger (and the new Tweetdeck feature called deck.ly) allows for long Twitter post, yet I don't like using it because it betrays the spirit of Twitter. Shortly enough, these conversations died down (several of them never replied to my rebuttals), and Twitter returned to "normal".

I am not sure if using Twitlonger is how apologetics will have to be spoken of in Twitter, or if there is a unique, Twitter-specific way to do it. Yet I know that at some point, the "how" must be overshadowed by the "do". Yes, I am a coward and shy by nature, but salvation is at stake. To the glory of God may little Twitter account point others to Christ.