We are exploring the world of foods with Brooks. Yesterday was cantaloupe day… Seems rather successful.
the boy taking on his first cantaloupe
Growth in Africa outpaces decline in U.S.
NEW YORK (UMNS) — The 2010 State of the Church Report tells United Methodists something they are already painfully aware of — U.S. membership is continuing its long decline even as the denomination expands internationally. In the decade between 1998 and 2008, overall membership grew by 14 percent for those who come into membership by profession of faith and 27 percent for baptized members. At the end of 2008, the church had approximately 11 million professing members and an additional 2.5 million baptized members in Africa, Europe, the United States and the Philippines. But U.S.membership has declined every year since The United Methodist Church was formed in 1968 and dropped by nearly 590,000 between 1998 and 2008.
“do the church dance” : also known as my next youth ministry lesson
this might be something for friends of mine like matthew paul turner to give some satirical response.. me, i’m just wondering if my church would allow me back if i tried to dance like this.. i’m guessing not, so i do what all youth leaders do, get the kids to do it. muhahaha!
prezi for the presentation : not your mamma’s powerpoint
i tweeted about prezi the other day. erin told me i needed to check it out (she was quite proud to know that she knew something tech that i didn't). i am doing a quick intro presentation on tech & church today for a small group of pastors and the rest of the time together is q&a and i thought, heck i'll try out prezi for this.
well, it is really cool!
what i've done is pretty simple. i've taken images that i've garnered for other presentations over the year and inserted them all onto my 'canvas.' i did the path thing for the few slides i want to make sure to start going through getting the session time going, but after that you can move in and out and focus onto each element on the canvas as questions or ideas come up.
i am super stoked about that. so many times in doing these church presentations on tech you get a huge gamut of knowledge, questions, and 'expertise.' now i can adapt for the audience as i see who is there and the questions they ask.. brilliant! i can also put a number of presentations on the canvas and then just re-route the 'path' of the presentation for a more specific focused presentation.
i'm stoked to share this with this pastors group and i'm stoked to share this with you & tell you to go kick the tires. it does cost an annual fee, but not an unrealistic fee. especially for those who use it on a regular basis.
note: for the stickler, i did correct the gutenberg spelling.
methoApp : the methodist church into the 21st century mobile technology
you might have seen my tweet about it, or maybe the article itself about the british methodist church's new iphone app. in the short time i've had it i really do like it. my quick thoughts:
it isn't over done: too often when we make stuff in the church it has to do everything for everyone and it ends up sucking at all things. like a 'one size fits all' life preserver, it doesn't actually fit anyone. so it has a daily prayer, a daily scripture meditation & news.
it has a simple news section that not only provides the usual suspect news on the methodist church, but also tweets mentioning 'methodist' (at least that seems to be the key search term, so you should see this posting show up at some point).
the formatting is really good. some of the stuff other churches put out is taken from some other medium and just put in through some cut & paste job. i appreciate that the content looks like it should be there.
it is free.. that is a nice part about any iphone app.
i know some of the other umc agencies and entities of the church are trying to put out their own application, i think they'd be wise to take a look at the first one on the scene