Social media is an effective vessel for New York Jets quarterback Tim Tebow to carry his religious message. When he quotes Scripture or wishes people a good night with God's blessings, he has an audience of nearly 2 million public subscribers to his Facebook page and more than 1.5 million followers on Twitter.
For average social media users, however, deciding how much of their personal faith to disclose online is not so easy.
Will sharing my religious life make me more or less likely to get a date? Make new friends? Expand professional networks?
If they just disclosed that they are Catholic or United Methodist or Jewish, Facebook users can pretty much stop worrying, new research with young adults indicates.
Studies of college students also reveal, however, that both the costs and the benefits may increase the more people share about their faith. Those with similar religious beliefs will have more positive impressions of those who disclose a great deal about their faith; others may be more likely to hold negative stereotypes of individuals who talk about God's plan for their lives and list Casting Crowns, Switchfoot and Mercy Me among their favorite musical groups.
The findings that spiritual dialogue is dominated by those already committed to their faith also may be sobering news to religious groups hoping Facebook and Twitter may provide a shortcut to evangelizing younger generations.
Online faith
Issues of online privacy now are drawing intense scrutiny from federal regulars and Congress.
The recent report of an ill-considered Facebook post "checking out" Sarah Palin by one of the Secret Service agents linked to an ongoing sex scandal is only the latest in a series of high-profile social media gaffes.
But worries over how much to share on sites such as Facebook and MySpace have long been a concern of users.
Nearly three-quarters of young adults ages 18 to 25 in the Pew Research Center's 2006 Generation Next Survey said people their age post too much personal information on the Internet.
And young adults seem reluctant to reveal a lot about their faith online.
Researchers Piotr Bobkowski of the University of Kansas and Lisa Pearce of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill found more than 60 percent of a sample of 560 young adults listed a religious identity in their MySpace profiles.
They also found, however, that fewer than one in three of the profile owners said something about religion outside of disclosing their religious identity. Those who were more likely to talk about their faith were young adults who believe religion is a public matter or have positive views of organized religion.
Overall, the study showed "social media users rarely disclose much about religion in their online profiles and, when they do, their disclosures tend to be brief and superficial," Bobkowski and Pearce wrote in an article on "Baring Their Souls in Online Profiles or Not? Religious Self-Disclosure in Social Media in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.
In a separate study of the effects of online Christian self-disclosure, Bobkowski and Sriram Kalyanaraman of the University of North Carolina found few negative consequences of social media users merely revealing a religious identity online.
"Identifying your religious affiliation doesn't seem to affect the way you are perceived," Bobkowski said in an interview. "It doesn't seem to hurt you. It doesn't seem to benefit you. It's just an is."
What they found did matter in their study of 233 undergraduates reacting to test profiles is how much was shared about faith.
Very religious participants tended to view extensively disclosing Christians as significantly more likable and more romantically desirable than either nominally disclosing Christians or non-disclosers, Bobkowski and Kalyanaraman reported in an article in the JSSR.
Regardless of how much was shared about faith, religious respondents rated profile owners as more likeable and less stereotypically negative than less religious respondents.
However, the least religious respondents tended to rate extensively disclosing Christians as least romantically desirable and with more negative stereotyping, the researchers reported.
How much to disclose may depend on who your online friends are.
"It all depends on the audience that individual is trying to communicate to, and the most important element of the audience they are trying to influence," Bobkowski said.
Looking ahead
There is still a great need for more research on religious disclosure in social media. But what is available seems to be consistent with other studies showing a wariness among young adults toward organized religion.
For instance, three-quarters of respondents ages 18 to 24 said modern-day Christianity "has good values and principles." But more than six in 10 respondents said it is anti-gay and "judgmental," according to the Public Religion Research Institute's 2012 Millennial Values Survey.
In the larger picture, Bobkowski said, social media seems to be more reflective of young people's attitudes toward religion than an instrument of change. The great majority of religious dialogue online is dominated by individuals who are already invested in religion.
For religious groups, that means Facebook and Twitter do not appear to be shortcuts for the hard work of reaching out in personal ways to make their faith relevant to younger generations.
"It's not the magic pill that clergy and religious leaders might be looking for to get young people involved in religion," Bobkowski said.
And for those seeking to use social media to increase their romantic prospects or find a job, it may be best to worry less about disclosing their religious preferences, and to spend that time developing their personalities and polishing off their resumes.
Unless you are planning on winning the Heisman trophy, leading a series of dramatic comeback wins in the NFL and becoming part of a quarterback controversy in the nation's leading media market. Did someone say Tim Tebow?
Then you can expect 135,000 likes when you wish everyone a Merry Christmas
David Briggs writes the Ahead of the Trend column for the Association of Religion Data Archives.
Follow David Briggs on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ReligionData
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Its great in a closed family group, especially a large family, and planning events.
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What more could they possibly say? What do they know? That they know little? Received knowledge which is internalized as an unquestionable set of truths makes it difficult for the believer to engage in open and free exchanges concerning that system.
"Will sharing my religious life make me more or less likely to get a date?"
I wouldn't touch you with a barge pole, and I'll tell you why. I consider faith to be a private matter. Haul it out and shake it around, and I'll say a firm goodbye.
Just saying....
It's all academic, as I'm married.
Idiots.
The problem I have with it, is when religious peers post religious things but expect non-religious people not to comment. If you put your opinion or thoughts into an open forum, you are opening yourself to open response - this is the nature of social media.
It isn't the content - it's poster' reaction when they do not get the expected reception of raining 'Amen's and 'Hallelujah's. It is a constant battle to engage in what a peer considers a formidable portion of their life, when it is completely off-limits in a strictly in-limits medium.
No.
That always frosts their shorts, doesn't it? ;-)
Actually, a lot of common parlance that has religious roots gets them knickered - apparently non-religious folk aren't supposed to be using religious words at all.
Which makes me wonder what Pastafarians yell in the sack. (there's the start of a great set of jokes - ha!)
My only FB friends are actual friends and family. I only post pics of the grandkids and enjoy reading family member's posts about their kids and trips, etc.
I even kept my sister on after months of those "daily devotional
type posts and pictures of kittens with Bible verses under them. But then she sent me "Letter From Hell"--said they were encouraging all their junior high church kids to send it out to friends who were not members of their church and she thought I might benefit from it as well.
I unfriended her immediately. My own sister.
Google it and see why.
We are no longer being invited to any family functions.
Apparently being Jewish also means embracing Israel despite their American citizenship.
I figure that since Israel claims to be a sovereign nation, that we should also let them be financially sovereign since they refuse our political advice.
Our nation is messed up - religion and politics are polluting each other to the point that it is difficult to separate the two. Our nation is starting to resemble those that breed terrorists.
As long as any war vet is in need, and any road/ bridge needs repair, any American goes without healthcare, I don't want anr penny going to Israel (other than if there is a natural disaster). For ME, the same goes for the UK, as I have dual citizenship.