It's a very sad day indeed...

We learned yesterday that Mira Brouwer, the four year old little girl on whose behalf I had my head shaved last month, has died. Her funeral is scheduled for early next week. She and her family had gone to Florida on a much needed vacation where she became ill with complications from the chemo. Her last week was on a ventilator in Pediatric ICU. I hate Cancer.

May God welcome Mira home! She touched so many lives in her short time on this earth. After three years of cancer, she is finally pain free. I am envisioning Mira with smiles, laughing and dancing in a field of yellow flowers with an abundance of energy and all of the precociousness that a four year old should have.

May God bless Mira's parents Christine and Chris and her brother Jackson as they mourn her passing and try to figure out how to be a family without her physical presence. For them, the pain has just really begun. Just how does one pick up the pieces after the death of their child? I selfishly pray that I never find out. I am grateful to a know that our loving God is there to carry them through this most painful time.

Please take time to tell those you love how important they are to you. I can assure you that Aidan has gotten a few more hugs and "I love yous" in the last two days.

I love technology!

So after spending 10 plus hours on the road yesterday, I get home to reports of a dead home computer. Upon further review this morning, the computer is not dead, but surge protector is fried. Trip one to Best Buy to get a more robust Surge protector with battery backup. Still no Internet connection. After several calls, trip number two, down to Time Warner to get a replacement Modem (was not on the surge protector, crap). Now I have hard wire connectivity after two more calls to initialize the modem. Trip number three, back to Best Buy to get a new wireless router and a second surge protector. A mere $300, three trips out and twelve hours later, we are a connected house again with all PCs operational, Yipee!

Now here's the question to ponder....

Let me set the stage. The problem affected two different circuits (aka different breakers) in the house. On one circuit, one outlet with two surge protectors, and only one surge protector is fried. On the other circuit, only the modem and wireless router blew up. No other damage to anything else in the house, no electrical storms for months. None of my neighbors had anything similar nor did they see anything funny with power.

What happened??

Gremlins, that's all I'm saying.

Like I said you have to love technology (or not). At least I got to remember how much of my troubleshooting technique I have forgotten over the last few years. Three trips out is embarrassing.......

Updates in Second Life

I wanted to share an interesting paper written by the "Rector" of the Anglican Cathedral in SL. In May, Arkin Ariantho (aka Rev. Mark Brown) is attending a meeting in the UK "for a meeting hosted by the Bishop of Guildford that will discuss in some detail the Anglican ministry in SL."

Here is the link to access the paper he wrote for the meeting. There are many interesting implications that tie into many of our discussion over the last three weeks in particular.

Breaking Free of the Web

I am afraid that my review of this reading will come across as exceedingly negative. While I read several similar concerns that I share with the authors, I was disapponted in the lack of scholarship. Thirteen references fo rht entire book not only prevented me from further study, but left me feeling that the book was anectodtal. I also felt that the book was very repetitive and filled with Church propaganda.

That said, I am abundantly aware of the dangers that lurk on line. I would classify three of y family members as Internet addicts. They do not fall into the cyber porn and sex chat rooms that Young and Klausing seemed obsessed with, but do place connectivity above most other things including family. As such I connected sections of the book such as pp 11-15, 66-67.

I was also hoping that they would delve deeper into what is now my new obsession with identity development, human relationship and intimacy and how these processes differ between online and offline existence. Young and Klausing state many of my concerns/questions almost verbatim on pp126-128, and do reference the work of Erik Erickson. While I have not had the time to reference this work directly, I did take time to begin a rather elaborate lit search on this topic and came across some interesting abstracts. Let's see if the library can get them for me.

Contemplations on Blogging

I'm glad to have spent time exploring the blogosphere this term. I've encountered many interesting blogs where people are seemingly posting thoughts/perspectives that are truly worth contemplating. Blogging is a great way to catch a glimpse into different modes of thinking and being that I know I would not necessarily have access to otherwise, so this is very good. That said I have seen plenty of what I would deem as junk. I'm not suggesting that this is a fault or symptom of the medium though as there is certainly a mix of good and junk on TV as well. Anyway, Richard commented this week on how time consuming blogging can be. I agree wholeheartedly with that as I have a tendency to actually follow links and can get lost for hours after which, I am hard pressed to be able to identify what of value I had just read/accomplished.

So I come back to context and audience. Why are bloggers posting in the first place? Is it to start a dialogue or simply publish thoughts via an online journal? The answer to this question then determines whether or not the author has a specific audience in mind or not. I still think that there are great uses for blogging, but as with most things, it is a tool that should be used to support/encourage a process, not act as the process. I read another post here where Drew seems to be contemplating something similar.

Lastly, I am pondering relationships and how far we can really go in creating authentic relationships without the benefit of physical presence (i.e. touch). I really appreciated our class discussion on this last week, and am finding myself researching more on this topic. I hope to share some findings on this in the last weeks of class. For now, this blogger needs to have some physical contact/presence in order to fully appreciate and experience the relationship. For me as I think ahead to my ministry, I hope that my heightened awareness of the importance of the physical, is something that I remain mindful of when counseling to my parishioners.

Religion in Cyberspace

Well I have to concur with others' posts that this book is fantastic! I am not quite done with it yet, as I am spending far more time contemplating the articles than I ever expected. As of this time, I have only gotten through Chapter nine, but will finish the book before class. My head is swimming with a multitude of thoughts ranging from content/information overload to identity and community development, to the worship of technology itself, to the state of contemporary society and the seeming shift from the face to face in part due to the constraints on our time and competing interests.

As I have gone through this course, a focus of mine has been to learn how I can expand the face and reach of the Episcopal Church through interactive technology. As I sit here now, pondering our class last week and this book in particular, I'm beginning to contemplate a new series of questions all together.

1)With the dynamic nature and sheer quantity of information sharing, relationship development, social trust and the evolution of technology itself, are we better suited to try and develop a methodology or lens for sorting through the tsunami of information that is currently available, that will help folks discern what is valid/important to them and what is not? I know that this is a precarious position and by its very nature risks the type of censorship that was also discussed; that's not what I want to do.

2) Or, is the issue really more about taking to heart the disenfranchisement with traditional religions and addressing that as a root cause for people seeking out NRMs online in order to have needs met.

3) What about the state of our contemporary society and all of this need for instant gratification and its impact on the way we interact with each other. What are we losing in relationship?

4) It seems intuitive that people are going to seek out and investigate or try new things as they come available; akin to teenage rebellion. It seems to me that in time, the rebellious/curious pendulum would swing back towards center. However, given the rate at which technology is changing the face of our existence, are we losing the opportunity for that pendulum to swing back? Have we lost the opportunity for market correction?

5) And lastly, how do we head off the incredible divide between the developed West and those areas of the world that simply do not have access to the Internet? Interestingly enough, my immediate concern was not on how much the non connected lose out on, but what those of us who are connected are missing in the rich cultures and ways of being and relating to each other by the non-connected. The technology divide creates a two way loss.

For now, this is simply a dump of the main thoughts running through my head that I had to get out and sleep over tonight. A more coherent post tomorrow.

Success in SL!!

Wow, I finally got into Second Life and participated in my first online Evening Prayer. There were two other women who were trying Evening Prayer for the first time in a group as well. Pretty cool experience although I must admit that as I was trying to fumble my way through controls, it was a bit distracting as prayer goes. We're going to tentatively meet again tomorrow night and I have been invited to a weekly discussion group this Saturday. We'll see how it goes!

As for how I was able to finally connect.... There was a new version of the application that was made available 2 days ago. I downloaded it and voila! I was in.

It's nice to feel some success and this means I don't have to make a last minute switch to my project!! Thanks be to God!!