Searching for a good church for a workmate who lives on the other side of the city? Looking for new resources for your small group, but don’t know where to begin? Wanting to be more up to date with Christian news from around Sydney?
From October 18 Sydney Anglicans will have a new home on the Internet – [url=http://www.sydneyanglicans.net]http://www.sydneyanglicans.net[/url] – that is designed to be a ‘one-stop shop’ for news, views and information about the Diocese.
Anglican Media has developed the new site to provide a more unified web presence for the Diocese, which currently operates four separate sites.
The new website will be launched on the first day of Synod and will feature an on-demand streaming video of Archbishop Peter Jensen’s Presidential Address, which can be watched at any time on the Internet. It will be available by 10pm on October 18.
“For the Diocesan Mission to succeed, good communication is vital,” says Anglican Media’s CEO, Allan Dowthwaite.
“New media, particularly the Internet, can play a pivotal role in this. Sydney Anglicans have never had one place to come to find out about what’s going on in their Diocese. This new site will bring together Christians in a new online community.”
The popular Anglican Media website, [url=http://www.anglicanmedia.com.au]http://www.anglicanmedia.com.au[/url], that has become the de facto home page of the Diocese, will cease to exist, as will the Mission site, [url=http://www.themission.com.au]http://www.themission.com.au[/url].
Web users logging on to these sites will be transferred to [url=http://www.sydneyanglicans.net]http://www.sydneyanglicans.net[/url]. The Secretariat website, [url=http://www.sydney.anglican.asn.au]http://www.sydney.anglican.asn.au[/url], and gospel site [url=http://www.christianity.net.au]http://www.christianity.net.au[/url], will be clearly linked to the new online location.
“Many of the key features of the current sites have been kept,” Mr Dowthwaite explained. “There will still be daily links to news from around Australia and the world, but there will be a greater focus on what’s happening in the Sydney Diocese at a local parish level.
“The popular prayer section of the Mission site will be given a much higher profile, and the well-frequented community forums are to continue.”
New features include a ‘find-a-church’ search engine with map for locating Anglican churches in Sydney. Resources for the Mission will be road-tested to gauge their effectiveness, and there will be articles that interact with theological, social and cultural issues from an evangelical perspective.
Anglican Media’s Multimedia Director, Mark Hadley, who is coordinating the project, also sees opportunities for reaching the lost through the site.
“Christians have to be taking the gospel to the market place and there are few places as ‘idea-hungry’ as the Internet,” Mr Hadley said. “It is where the ‘online generation’ are finding out about the world.”
Archbishop Jensen believes the site will be a powerful tool for communication in the Diocese. “I am delighted with the progress made by Anglican Media with this new website. It will help resource our work and enable us to encourage each each other in prayer and in mission. I believe it is going to be a great success.”
