Tuesday, February 13, 2007

A Lesson in Humility

A source of great danger to our spiritual well-being is the excessive focus that we may place on our own lives, our achievements and failures, to the exclusion of the lives of those around us. This is a form of pride, and the cure is humility.

I speak here about the pride with which I have seen the readership of The Continuum grow steadily over the 15 months since its inception. For those of you interested in statistics, our daily average of hits during the first full year of operation was 80. We are now up to around 120. That's an increase of 50%!

120 hits per day. Impressive, no?

I thought so, until I checked in at Kendall Harmon's Titusonenine this morning to discover that he had a record day yesterday -- 10,000 hits! That's about one-third of The Continuum's entire total since it was created.

How's that for a little perspective?

And perspective is a very essential element of humility. One should not exagerate one's accomplishments. At the same time, however, one should not falsely understate reality. That leads to false humility.

The fact is that Canon Harmon's blog has been around a great deal longer than mine, and it is directed to a potential audience -- the mainstream Anglican Communion and those interested in it -- that is far greater than ours in number. If you put things in perspective, then, perhaps The Continuum's performance ain't all that bad.

In the end, however, all that matters is that we endeavor to do with this medium of blogging the best that we can, always remembering that it is not our glory that we are seeking but the greater glory of God.

All that said, please do your best to let people know about this blog, so that we can give the good canon a run for his money!

8 comments:

Tregonsee said...

A good showing for those who have been well ahead in understanding what ECUSA/TEC was about. Thanks for being here!

A suggestion for Continuum discussion in general is what is at least for now the direction of the AC meeting in Dar es Salaam. The reports of a proposed official parallel Province includes specifically bringing in members of the REC and the Continuum. While wildly premature, that will not stop me from at least wondering what the minimum requirements would be for such a structure to be acceptable to the major components of the Continuum?

poetreader said...

Affirmstion of St. Louis.

It's actually a prety minimal and basic statement of the Catholic Faith, and, while I could see intercommunion with bodies not quite up to that standard, I could not live with organic union on less agreement.

ed

Albion Land said...

To AP Biddle,

Thanks for you comment and kind words.

Can you cite specifically a proposal that envisages a new province that would envisage somehow incorporating REC and the Continuum? I would be happy to post a separate item on that, if you can provide me with something.

However, given the wide divergences in ecclesiology among those in the TEC pushing for a separate province (and mirrored in lumping the REC and Continuum together), it would seem to me to be a non-starter.

My gut feeling is that any new province that might emerge would be too broad church. The Continuum needs to be there for those who ultimately will not be comfortable with it.

Sadly, the Continuum is too divided to offer a common welcome mat, and I fear many people/parishes/dioceses will fall through the cracks.

Note to all: StandFirminFaith (linked here) is up and running with live, daily coverage of the Dar-es-Salaam meeting.

Albion Land said...

This is a reference to the proposal:

http://www.livingchurch.org/publishertlc/viewarticle.asp?ID=3071

Albion Land said...

Hi Karen,

Thanks again to you folks for your very kind testimonial.

Just for the record, I got my terminology wrong. When I said hits, I meant visits. The number of hits is just a shade over twice that of visitors.

I think Site Meter is great. I can see where readers are, and can also see what has linked them to us. That often provides the opportunity for getting to know a new blog and for sharing.

We are truly blessed with this medium and with the opportunities it provides us to witness to Christ.

Alice C. Linsley said...

Albion, God will continue to bless this site. It is unique and serves an important role. I read The Continuum almost daily and am always strengthened by what I read.

Anonymous said...

AL,

A few things to keep the site comparisons in perspective:

T1:9 posts a minimum of a dozen new links every day. More posts equals more hits.

T1:9 is primarily a "link dump." That term is not here used pejoratively; it simply describes a blog whose purpose is to provide links to other sites. Your site is almost all original material.

Unless I am mistaken, T1:9 has many people working on it. You all only have 4.

You've already mentioned T1:9's longer existence and larger target audience.

We've all got our little corners on the information superhighway. I'm glad you're occupying yours.

Jason Kranzusch

Albion Land said...

Bless you, Jason