Religion and the Internet

The research on the relationships between religion and the Internet has been developing in depth and in diversity in recent years. In parallel with the rise of digitally mediated activities, there has been rapid growth in research examining how religion (meaning the individual and institutionalized beliefs, interests, and praxis of specific faith traditions) interacts with the possibilities and constraints of technology-mediated communication and, recently, social media. In light of the growing range of interactions between religion and the Internet, this entry reviews the varied forms in which contemporary religion is manifested in multimodal communication practices. Specifically, this entry examines the capacities of digital media to facilitate religious communication and how it reveals not only new expressions of religious discourse but also how significant tensions are ...