March 9, 2009

Paper or plastic is no longer a choice for an increasing number of Christians. Many now receive church news only by plastic-encased personal computer rather than traditional parchment.

But that doesn’t mean churches don’t still face an either/or decision on how best to package their product.

At Fellowship Christian Church in Springfield, Ohio, senior pastor Grant Edwards has done away with the traditional paper newsletter sent to homes by snail mail. Instead, the 750-member church fires off an email containing an e-news article of fewer than 200 words.

“One of the things that has happened is that the amount of content with every successive generation has dropped,” said Edwards, who formed the church 35 years ago. “With the younger generation you have to get the info to them in 140 (characters) or less.”

The challenge for Edwards, and for church leaders of other multi-generational churches, is how to best balance the technological needs of younger people with the wishes and requirements of the older crowd.

“We have to have all forms of information,” Edwards said. “We still hand out paper (during services) but we have to have podcasts, too.”

Keeping all generations happily informed under one roof is becoming an increasingly difficult task. While Americans of every age have become comfortable with technology, their dependence upon it differs depending on the age group.

The generational divide brought on by digital tools is significant, according to a new research study conducted by The Barna Group. The key finding shows that each successive generation is adopting and using technology at a significantly greater pace than their predecessors. Connected to that discovery is the exponential reliance on tech tools among those under age 25.

“I was surprised how technically reliant every generation is on the most basic of Internet tools – email and search – but when you look at each generation successively the gap is huge,” Barna Group President David Kinnaman said. “It’s not as though you can just make a sweeping statement about those over 40 years old and under 40, because then you will have missed two big jumps there.”

The study broke out four generational groups – Mosaics (ages 18-24); Busters (25-43), Boomers (44-62) and Elders (63+) – and surveyed whether their Internet technology use was mainstream, emerging or limited. Mainstream means technology used by at least one out of every two computer users; emerging means technologies used by at least one out of five but less than half of computer users; limited means technologies used by fewer than one-fifth of computer users.

The gap between Mosaics and Busters was particularly surprising, Kinnaman said, explaining that while Busters fit the Mainstream classification in four digital categories, the Mosaics depend on eight forms of internet technology. That’s a big difference, considering that the two generations bump up against one another.