E-Klesiologi Dinamika Berkomunitas di Era Digital Sebagai Upaya Membangun Konsep Gereja Digital (Digital Church)

The research in this thesis is motivated by the phenomenon of new patterns, styles and ways of churching as a community of faith in the digital era. The church is experiencing a cultural and social shift in congregational life that is no longer identical to the pre-COVID-19 Pandemic era. To explore this issue, the author uses the theory of Deborah Lupton and F. Budi Hardiman which examines socio-cultural ideas about digital technology. Then the author uses the ideas of Jay Y. Kim and Salto Deodatus Simanullang regarding the church as a connected mystical fellowship. The description of the church in the digital era based on the digital community emphasizes three theological dimensions in this paper, namely: the church as a connected mystical fellowship, the practice of churching digitally as a vision of Christianity, and the church as a reflection of the reality of a digital community that is networked in the digital space in everyday life. This study uses a qualitative method with the Religious-Social Shaping of Technology (RSST) approach to compare digital communities and connected mystical fellowships. The author concludes that the characteristics of the digital world massively shape digital society through personal and communal relations that take place digitally as a social network. In other words, the characteristics of the digital world function to configure subjectivity, embodiedness, and social relations in digital communities including in church life which is a connected mystical fellowship. The church as a connected mystical fellowship can build a digital community as a fellowship of God's people through two aspects. (1) Fellowship carried out in digital space cannot be separated from the presence of the body in the analog world which has a sacramental dimension and aims to connect its members towards harmony and wholeness as a unity of analog-digital bodies that intertwine in the love of Christ. (2) Through relations in a connected mystical fellowship, a sense of shared responsibility between humans can be spread in order to build a world that opens up goodness for all. The dynamics of community in the digital era as a fellowship of God's people can build the concept of a digital church (e-clesiology) through four aspects, namely: (1) The digital church shows that the fellowship of God's people has expanded its identity as a network of connected relations and a community of connected social networks that have personal and communal dimensions in digital space. (2) Digital worship needs to be interpreted as the body of Christ which is a sacramentality and solidarity that presents the body of the congregation in the dynamics of church life in a mixed manner and displays the harmony and integrity of creation as the body of Christ that inter-embodies in all creations including in the digital space. (3) The digital church communication model needs to be interpreted in the understanding of Christ as God's communicator. Christ as the link between God and humanity shows that the connectedness of human existence with church life has now been united in the person of Christ (John 1:1-14). At the same time, Christ is also present on the border that allows for communication between bodies on the boundaries (liminal) of connected social networks. (4) The church needs an adaptive and transformational leadership model that is willing to be open and listen humbly to the voices of all people. This requires intergenerational communication and an egalitarian culture of openness, as well as mutual learning in understanding the mindset, expectations, perceptions and modes of communication of each generation.