Quora is a neat webpage for asking questions and providing answers.  With tags and categories you can direct your question to a specific group of people (anyone following that topic).  You can also go on and search topics for questions.  As with any internet forum, there are trolls, but Quora does a good job of steering them away.  As a whole, Quora questions tend to be answered by real people.

Two weeks ago, I asked “How is an Atheist comforted in times of tragedy?” and have gotten back some thoughtful answers.  I am hoping to post more questions, but I am well-aware of how ugly internet debates on religion can get.  Here are some guidelines I’m developing for such an interaction.

1. Be Responsible:  Quora allows for anonymity, but encourages people to identify by name and to claim an expertise.  I use my real name.  In the Religion topics, I self-identify as “United Methodist Pastor”.  I’m accountable at all times to myself, my profession, my Church and my God.
2. Be positive:  I think I can best represent the faith by not being argumentative.  Also Quora allows you to “Thank” someone for their post.  I believe it is more Christian to show appreciation than to sling criticism.  There are times for engaging and debating, but I find the internet too full of venom.
3. Seek to learn:  Given that all-out debate is so often fruitless, I’m taking the approach of using the forum to better myself.  My interest in this question stemmed from a comment made in Disciple study about what to say at the funeral of a non-believer.  I know what I would say, but I wondered, “what would be of use?”
4. Diffuse any potential antagonism:  I added a disclaimer on the end of my question: “***I ask this in all sincerity and appreciate any honest answer.”  This little gesture has seemed to disarm people in a good way and several people have made note of it in their answers.  This suggests to me that there are too many Christians looking for a fight on the internet.  Or there are too many Christians getting suckered into venomous debates over religion on the internet.
5. Stick to the words:  A couple of answers were quite sharply written.  It would have been easy to read too much ‘heat’ into them.  But on face-value those comments aren’t as harmful as they initially seemed.
6. Don’t over-correct:  Some answers grossly misrepresent the Christian faith and the intentions of religious people.  In the end, I decided to assume that that was our problem (the Church’s) not their problem.  There is so much I don’t know about the answerers’ lives.  We have burned people at the stake.