Churches :-) Think Outside of the Square... Re: [Linux-aus] (no subject)

[David Lloyd]

Well!

> This group is known to have actively sought out young Christians to 
> undermine their Faith. They advocate drug use, orgiastic/homosexual 
> activity, body piercing, scarification, branding and other perversions 
> associated with the hardcore _Goth_ lifestyle that their senior membership
> is obsessed with.

Damn! I wonder if they use free software as well...

Just to turn this around a little, ITShareSA Inc's second WFTD scheme
happens to be housed in a little place in Victor Harbor that happens to be
owned by a church. Part of our lease says that "We must not use the premises
for immoral grounds" and we have to be very careful about not swearing or
using other such classis computer tech words such as "That f*(*((*ng hard
drive" around Paster Lew [spelling - it's not Loo but that's how it's
pronounced].

Somehow we've managed to make such an impression on the Pastor and his flock
that they're bringind donated equipment to us. We will reciprocate by
helping them with their IT needs. As we don't give away closed source
software (unless we can somehow afford the licence - yeah, right) this will
mean more and more people get to just "use" open source software.

No advocacy. No hard sell. Just "here's a solution, it works".

Now, most churches seem to have a reasonable population of poor and
disadvantaged people and/or know how to get into contact with them. Also,
churches regardless of what you think of their religion provide a good
network of people who all implicitly trust each other [up to an extent] on
another level.

What I'm saying is that one well placed, open source installation into a
church or a member of a church can spread throughout the whole church and
suddenly you've found a whole network of people who are willing to help the
open source cause. Not by advocacy but just by doing.

At least, ITShareSA Inc has.

So, let's all pray for this poor person who seems to be a tad upset by some
possibly fictitious cult but make sure we don't miss out on an opportunity
to use open source and to promote it in whatever communities we can.

DSL