With our inaugural post two weeks ago, we have officially launched ourselves into the world of nerd ministry. Did you learn more about nerdy ministries than you ever thought that you would? Were you surprised by anything? I would be lying if I said it didn’t throw me for a loop regularly that this ministry exists and is being done. And that it is being done so well. These are intended to be brief ventures into the world of other ministries, so I will end my waxing poetic here… enjoy the list!
These will be specifically related to nerd ministry, so be aware that these are not the be-all, end-all of resources. There are also only so many hours in the week - so these will be brief and unedited. I also will not be discriminating against these sources much. I don’t condone or approve of the theology, actions, or anything else that these entities might be involved with. These are purely things I find interesting or worth considering. Venture at your own risk or reward.
I greatly enjoyed this interview (and all of the interview tbh) from the Humans of Gaming podcast out of Love Thy Nerd. If you are at all interested in the games industry and their thoughts on religion - do yourself a favor and give this backlog a listen.
Andy is an exceptionally interesting case given the applicability of the website and book that he maintains as a measure to make games more accessible to faith-based family units. It’s not dissimilar from movie sites that tell you which movies have foul language or just remove the language in a mastercut - but it’s an intriguing ministry nonetheless.
I love the stuff going on over at Methodist Gaming. Even if I am a complete noob at all things FPS, I still enjoy watching the streams from Adam and Hannah. Of course… it’s also a bonus that they are fellow United Methodists.
From their About section:
“Join The Connexion & The Youth Connexion! Methodist Gaming is an online gathering and ministry of presence within the Twitch community and throughout social media. We identify ourselves as family content and follow the via media. The world is our stream!”
I am just now venturing into the mesmerizing backlog of Yuval Noah Harari and am greatly enjoying the journey. In his work 21 Lessons for the 21st Century from 2018, I was surprised to hear him begin to weigh in some thoughts around technology - mentioning Pokémon GO in particular! The entire book is an interesting look on where we are as a culture currently and I would recommend reading his other works, as well.
If you are at all like me, then you find yourself thinking about, watching, or researching anime much of the day. Given this and my field of study, I find myself thinking about the overlap of faith and anime quite often. In my search to find some other like me, I stumbled upon Beneath the Tangles and have been enamored by their consistent blogging about the things that I value the most.
From their website:
“If you’re visiting Beneath the Tangles for the first time, the reaction you might be having to our website is…wut? The convergence of Christian spirituality and anime might not be obvious to most, but we believe that there’s an inherent value in the blogging we do, both for believers in Christianity and those who aren’t.”
While we likely don’t agree on everything theologically, I am appreciative of the work that they are doing in the space and look forward to continuing to enjoy their work.
Okay… shameless self promo time, I’m sorry. I am a new writer for Rethink Church out of the big UMC and I chose to write my first article of the new Netflix anime Shaman King, which is actually an adaptation of a couple-decade-old manga series that I grew up reading. I was tickled pink to see an article about anime being posted on the official umc.org webpage, so I had to share it with all of you. I am proud of the work that the UMCom and UMC are doing in allowing art to faith. Wonderful work, good and faithful servant!
And that wraps up this Nerd of Mouth post. What did you think? Was this helpful? Encouraging? Inspiring? Or do you have some ideas of how we could make it better? Even better, would you be interested in doing it better? For now, that’s where we’ll leave it. Send ideas for improvement or ideas to be included to checkpointchurch@gmail.com.
Until next time,
God loves you.
We love you. You matter.
Buh-bye!