I have a confession to make – I would be in ecstasy if every individual OC/IC believer had a blog – and added something to it at least once every two weeks. My overarching reason stems from an idea that I’ve been banging on about for at least four years now that is the simple question: “Where are our voices?”

When I survey the net I find dozens of Episcopal, Jewish, Roman, Muslim, Presbyterian, Gnostic, and Emergent sites and blogs – produced by thoughtful individuals, and cooperatives. These sites, even the ones I strongly disagree with, are often a joy to read – because they encourage my own reflection, they inspire my own writing, and they make me consider ideas and issues that would otherwise have never passed across my desk.

One thing that stands out among these blogs, is a conversation among adherents to that particular tradition (a conversation which often spills across a series of blogs from that particular tradition) about what it means to be “Episcopalian” “Roman” “Muslim” or “Gnostic” now and how particular events within that community shift and re-shape that sense of self understanding. This element of the conversation draws in voices from the whole spectrum of their particular tradition.

Faith blogs demonstrate that there is a lively engagement with issues of faith and praxis going on at all levels across the spectrum of religious expression. And while blogging does have some significant drawbacks (some of which I’ve mentioned before and others I plan to explore soon), it seems to me that the benefits substantially outweigh them.

What is sad to me is that it seems to me that that there are, by proportion, so few OC/IC blogs. I wonder why, and again ask where are our voices? I have some suspicions on this point, but can’t quite put my finger on the “whole” picture yet.

Maybe the best thing to do is to put forward some of the reasons why I think we ought to encourage widespread blogging within the OC/IC movement. So rather than ask, where are our voices, I’ll answer the question: Why blog?

Networking – making connections with other OC/IC believers is a natural by-product of blogging. If those of us who already blog were to highlight other OC/IC bloggers, and include links to their sites on ours, we’d quickly create an easy resource for other OC/IC folk, as well as those seeking to know more, or better understand us (particularly the curious who just cant understand why we simply aren’t crushed under the weight of our obvious and overwhelming heresy).

Blogging allows OC/IC and non-OC/IC folk to see the wide variety of things we reflect on, debate, and care about as individual believers, and within our communities. This means that OC/IC folk see that the majority of us are not interested in ecclesiastical hemlines, jewels, broom cupboard cathedrals, and slinging anathemas at one another like high-speed sloshy lugies – that we really do care about our faith, our tradition, and yes, believe it or not, about one another.

Blogging allows for an ongoing exchange of ideas – one that (in theory) is not hurried or constrained by time. It allows for a exercises of “thinking out loud” with the audience – and through that conversation encouraging reflection on related issues, and refinement of ideas, which in turn, perhaps, in the fullness of time, leads to a fuller exposition of an idea in another format, such as a published work, a video, an art installation, a study day in your local community, a conference, or inviting a guest speaker to your parish to talk about the issues.

Let us not forget that scholarship, and the free exchange of ideas, is a core feature of the founding ideals of the OC/IC movement. The conversation through blogging has the potential of encouraging scholarship, something that in many respects is lacking in our movement. Rather, let me qualify that – we have plenty of scholars in the community, but they are largely unknown outside their immediate circle of friends and acquaintances. We need to be cultivating new scholarship, while at the same time encouraging more of the existing scholars within our ranks to become more public.

So, I blog, and I want to encourage all OC/IC people to blog about our faith and our tradition, because it encourages networking, it publicises what we are thinking (and doing), it encourages the exchange of ideas, it cultivates scholarship, and through scholarship – collaboration. Blogging in short is an easy way for us to get our voices heard not only within our own community, but also within the wider milieu of contemporary Christian thinking.