Part of the object of the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches is "upholding the liberal Christian tradition". I once commented that we should also support all liberal religion (which we do through interfaith work and the International Association of Religious Freedom), but since Unitarianism emerged out of Christianity, we do owe something to those roots. And the liberal Christian tradition certainly needs upholding — though the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and the Metropolitan Community Church are also doing a good job of upholding it.

So I was delighted to see that the Unitarian Christian Association is sponsoring two ground-breaking events:

St Mark's Centre for Radical Christianity, Sheffield: Spring Conference
Nicola Slee - Christa: The Female Christ: Exploring the humanity of Christ through Theology and Art
Saturday 17 April 2010, 10.30am - 4.00pm
At St Mark's Church, Broomhill, Sheffield

St Mark's Centre for Radical Christianity, Sheffield: Autumn Conference
'Mysticism and Contemporary Spirituality'
Saturday 6 November 2010, 10.30am - 4.00pm
At St Mark's Church, Broomhill, Sheffield

Now that's what I call upholding the liberal Christian tradition.

You can find out more about images of the female Christ and the gay Jesus from the excellent Jesus in Love, the blog of Kittredge Cherry, a Metropolitan Community Church minister, and author of several books, including Jesus in Love.

And there's lots of information about Christian mysticism on The Website of Unknowing, the blog of Carl McColman, also the author of several books, including The Big Book of Christian Mysticism.

A guest post by Rev Andrew Pakula.

The congregation that I lead - the Newington Green and Islington Unitarians - has grown extremely quickly over the past several years. What we have done is not magic. It depends on a variety of well-known and well-tested strategies. It depends on steps also that change attitudes from self-centred to 'other-centred' - an absolutely critical culture change.

I want to share what I have learned and what works.

I have outlined a scheme below. It offers a clear step-wise approach to congregational growth. It is important to note that these recommendations do not define the only path to growth, but any congregation that successfully follows this programme has a very good chance of achieving their aims.

Some of the more advanced steps may seem daunting. Any journey must be taken one step at a time. When climbing a mountain, it is best not to start out by focusing on the peak - focus on the natural next step for your congregation. Achieving the next step will give you a sense of accomplishment that will energize you for more.

And so, I offer this programme to you to do with as you wish. The programme is organized into four levels which correspond to levels of accomplishment in working toward growth.
If you want to use them, your congregation may choose to make achieving a given level a cause for celebration. I hope you will! Groupings of congregations (e.g. districts) may choose to adopt the scheme and create ways of recognizing and providing incentives for congregations that complete a particular level. You may use it as the road map for a growth group or growth leader.

I will also be very happy to answer questions and offer guidance and advice to any Unitarian congregation that is interested. 

Bronze

At least nine of the following:

1. A friendly and welcoming person is always available to greet newcomers as they arrive or enter the chapel
2. Signs at your building are clear and include welcoming language intended to draw newcomers
3. Worship is held according to a regular, publicly-available schedule
4. Newcomers are invited to attend at least one programme or event apart from Sunday services
5. Instructions (e.g. when to stand and sit) are offered during Sunday services spoken from the pulpit and/or in writing
6. Serve refreshments after services
7. A welcome message to newcomers is given from the pulpit at each Sunday service
8. There is a congregational web site, and it contains current, accurate information
9. Keep records of attendance and visitor numbers. Make these available to the congregation.
10. Evaluate the appearance of your building both inside and out with regard to how welcoming and attractive it is for newcomers.

Silver

Gold

At least nine of the following:

1. Develop a clear, compelling congregational purpose/mission statement with congregational approval OR prepare a consensus statement(s) of purpose/mission.
2. Keep the purpose/mission in front of the leadership and membership (e.g. printed in newsletters, spoken at meetings and services)
3. Place the challenges identified by the 'worshiper report' in order of descending priority. Take action on the top 5
4. Select a demographic segment of the local population and compile a report describing this group (e.g. tastes, lifestyles, media used, and interests) OR estimate the number and location of the people in your vicinity who are likely to find your current message and practices appealing.
5. Through a congregational process, develop and approve a set of expectations for how members of the congregation will be toward one another. Keep these expectations in the attention of the membership and leadership (e.g. in your newsletter and other appropriate literature)
6. Develop and approve a process for dealing with disruptive behaviour in the congregation OR have key leaders trained in conflict management.
7. At least one fourth of Committee members are new to the congregation (three years or less)
8. Put a process in place to ensure that visitors newcomers are spoken to by at least three people before and/or after the service.
9. Visitors to the Sunday service receive a welcome message (email, phone or post) by the end of the following Tuesday
10. Committee creates and commits to a covenant for its own practices. The covenant includes the expectation that all decisions will be made in the best interest of the congregation and its future.
11. The congregation is mentioned in the media at least four times in the preceding year.

Platinum

At least eight of the following:

1. Make a practice of asking new visitors for their honest impressions either in person, by phone, or using a written survey
2. Begin at least one new programme/service/event geared specifically toward the preferences of newcomers
3. Hold occasional newcomer orientation events intended to help them understand and feel more connected to Unitarianism and the congregation.
4. Train welcomers to help newcomers feel comfortable and connect to the congregation
5. Evaluate your congregation in light of your understanding of your target demographic group and list any identified challenges in descending order of importance. Take action on top 5.
6. Identify and alter 3 long-standing customs that do not foster growth
7. At least one third of Committee members are new to the congregation (three years or less)
8. Hold at least one workshop directly addressing resistance to growth.
9. The congregation is mentioned in the media at least six times in the preceding year.

(originally posted at Andy's blog, Throw Yourself Like Seed)

I just watched two excellent videos by Stephen Lingwood on "What is Unitarianism?" — they are very inspiring, and explain Unitarian views and values very succinctly.

Manchester Faith Groups Welcome Lords Amendment

Manchester Liberal Jewish Community has joined with local Unitarians in celebrating the amendment to the Equality Bill which will lift the current ban on Civil Partnerships being held in places of religious worship. The vote was passed in the House of Lords on Tuesday 2 March, by 95 votes to 21.

The amendment to the Equality Bill was jointly sponsored by the Unitarians, Liberal Judaism and the Quakers, with support from other inclusive religious communities such as the Metropolitan Community Church.

The Reverend Jane Barraclough, minister of Cross Street Unitarian Chapel in Manchester city centre, was enthusiastic about the news: "At last (if the bill is passed) liberal people of faith can register their partnerships in their places of worship. We can welcome all those who share our progressive and tolerant values to our churches and chapels and celebrate the blessing of their relationships and their lives together."

Equality, diversity and justice are core values for both Liberal Jews and Unitarians. Both movements have welcomed lesbian gay bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people into their congregations for many years. Openly LGBT people participate fully in community life and leadership in both movements, which includes some serving as rabbis and ministers. Both movements are to begin amending orders of service for same-sex commitment ceremonies.

Tim Moore, a member of Cross Street Chapel and Associate Member of MLJC added, "I am very proud to be so closely involved in two of the inclusive religious movements who have taken a unified stand for equality and tolerance and against prejudice and discrimination. The latest amendment on civil partnerships is just one more success in the growing national campaign for full marriage equality for LGBT people."

"Liberal Jews, Unitarians, Quakers and their supporters have witnessed to their faith based on conscience, guided by reason, and tested in welcoming communities. We will continue working with our partners on looking into ways of furthering the campaign in the North West for marriage equality."

Congratulations to all concerned. This is marvellous news.

(via GA Uni-News)

Other coverage

• Pink News: Lords back religious civil partnerships for gay couples
• The Independent: Gay weddings to be allowed in church
• The Guardian: Civil partnership church ban lifted

In preparation for the 200th anniversary of the birth of Elizabeth Gaskell, the Worship Panel has created a new information pack (PDF).

It includes worship materials, background information, a directory of events, and a list of contacts. It was compiled by Rev. Dr. Ann Peart, with two sections by Kay Millard and Rev. Jim Robinson.

(via GA Uni-News)

The Famous UUs site has a biography of Gaskell.

In Gaskell's estimation, true Christianity was not to be found in organized denominations nor in liturgy nor in theology. She believed and acted on a religion of works, "the real earnest Christianity which seeks to do as much and as extensive good as it can." Local action for change by those most intimately concerned, not government legislation, was her solution to social problems. Those who have should help those who have not. For her such charity began at or near home. She took her motto from Thomas Carlyle, "Do the duty that lies nearest to thee." Unitarian rationalist feminist journalist Frances Power Cobbe, after reading a story by Gaskell, wrote, "it came to me that Love is greater than knowledge — that it is more beautiful to serve our brothers freely and tenderly, than to hive up learning with each studious year."

The National Unitarian Fellowship (NUF) have videoed the President Rev Bob Wightman as he approaches the end of his term in office.

(from GA Uni-News)

Stratford Unitarians have utilised the website facility created by the DUWIT team and set up a new website for their congregation. The facility is completely free and includes a content management system (CMS) to enable the site to be updated from any computer connected to the internet.

If your congregation, district or society website looks dated or tired, do consider using this facility by contacting Essex Hall or by looking at www.ukunitarians.org.uk.

Andy Pakula, minister of New Unity (Newington Green and Islington Unitarians) has started a blog, called Throw yourself like seed. The title is from a poem by Miguel De Unamuno translated by Robert Bly.

Also, three of my blogs (dance of the elements, Stroppy Rabbit and the Bluestocking are on his blogroll - I feel honoured.

He started it in February, so we still have time to catch up with all the posts.

Welcome to the blogosphere, Andy!

The UU Growth blog has a fantastic collection of resources to help congregations grow. There is a similar section on the GA's Unitarian website called Congregational support.

A "Knol" is apparently a unit of knowledge, and Google has a site where people can post articles and tag them by topic. There are several of these articles that might be of interest to Unitarians:

An introduction to Unitarian Universalism, by Brian Crisan
Unitarian Universalism is a liberal religion that espouses no official creed.

The relationship between the Unitarians and the Brahmo Samaj, by Yvonne Aburrow
During the 1820s, Rammohun Roy made contact with Unitarians in Britain and America. He was a founding member of the Bengal Renaissance, a campaigner for women's rights and the abolition of sati, and founder of the Brahmo Samaj (a monotheistic reform movement in Hinduism). Since the 1820s, contact has been maintained between the Unitarians and the Brahmo Samaj.

Servetus & Calvin, by Standford Rives
Was It Murder by Calvin?
The trial of Servetus for alleged verbal crimes ended in October 1553 with a verdict of death. Servetus was burned alive the very next day. The question whether Calvin murdered Servetus as a judicial witness and prosecutor has dogged Calvin ever since.

Henry David Thoreau
Thoreau, Henry David (12 July 1817-6 May 1862), author and naturalist

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Emerson, Ralph Waldo (25 May 1803-27 Apr. 1882), lecturer and author

Elizabeth Gaskell (1810-1865)
Unitarian author

The Unitarian Historical Society has a collection of images of famous British Unitarians, Unitarian chapels in the UK and Ireland, and other historic events.

The arrival on the scene of a new Unitarian blog has just been pointed out to me. It's called Urban Unitarians, and it shares words of inspiration in the Unitarian spirit of tolerance and hope for the contemporary world. It's run by the urban Unitarians of Rosslyn Hill Chapel, London.

They've got some great posts up already, including book reviews, thoughts for the day, information about mandalas, reflections on liberal religion and humanism, and more. Check it out.

The Unitarian Universalist Association has launched a new website.

It's a new day for UUA.org! Our new home page addresses topics of interest to newcomers to Unitarian Universalism, including a video feature and an interactive banner highlighting our principles and beliefs. A short "Find a Congregation" form makes it easier than ever to look for a local congregation. People already familiar with our faith may want to bookmark the new Resources for UUs page, which features expert-recommended resources, multimedia, and more!

Full Article

The new website works better in larger screen resolutions, and has a more modern look to it, but you can still find your way around if you are more familiar with the old style of the site.

The General Assembly has agreed to accept donations to the Peace Fellowship Appeal for those who wish to claim gift aid or use CAF cheques. Please send your donation by cheque to GAUFCC with "Haiti Emergency Appeal" written on the back to Essex Hall, 1-6 Essex Street, London, WC2R 3HY. Alternatively you can also use PayPal to donate.

The Unitarian Peace Fellowship are co-ordinating our appeal. If you are a UK tax payer and this is the first donation you are making to the Unitarians (for this or any other appeal) we can claim an extra 28% if you download, complete and return this Gift Aid form.

• UK Unitarians Twibe
• Unitarian Universalist Twibe

Twibes is an application that allows people to group together on Twitter, the microblogging site, and tag posts with a particular tag or word so that they appear in the feed on the Twibe's page. The tags for the ukunitarians group are unitarian, unitarians, ukunitarians, uu, universalist (with or without #). We can have up to seven, so if you want extra ones, post a comment here.

UUA Announce 'Music in Worship'

The UUA now have a new expanded 'WorshipWeb' with a facility called "Music in Worship". Among other things, this includes a UU Composers Database.

Contributed by Rev Dr Linda Hart

MP3 files of all of the songs in Singing the Journey (STJ) can be downloaded at the STJ website. The UUA online shop has a music section with CDs, songbooks, music for children, and hymnals.

The Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans now has a podcast.

The first episode of the CUUPS Podcast features basic info about CUUPS and an interview with British academic Michael York recorded at the Dec. 2009 Parliament of World Religions provided to us courtesy of the Pagan Newswire Collective.

The Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans promotes networking among Pagan-identified Unitarian Universalists, and provides for the outreach of Unitarian Universalism to the broader Pagan community.

Michael York has written a book on Pagan Theology.

A podcast is a series of digital media files (either audio or video) that are released episodically and downloaded through web syndication.

International charities are appealing for donations to help Haiti.
In the UK the DEC - an umbrella group which launches and co-ordinates responses to major disasters overseas - has launched a Haiti Earthquake Appeal.

• Disasters Emergency Committee

These organisations also have ways to donate:

• Unicef UK
• Medecins Sans Frontieres
• International Red Cross
• World Food Programme

You can also donate to the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee / Unitarian Universalist Association Joint Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund

What UUSC will do

UUSC’s disaster response in Haiti will focus on those survivors less likely to have access to aid, such as child domestic workers (restaviks), women-headed households that work in the informal sector, and people living with HIV/AIDS. Haiti has a vibrant grassroots movement with a vision of empowering people. UUSC will work closely with partners in this grassroots movement to reach those survivors at greatest risk of being overlooked. As of this afternoon, we’ve already connected with three organizations and will be reaching out to others over the next 24 hours in order to shape our response.

We will be updating our website regularly as our plans develop.

The Landfill Prize - the award for Britain's most useless consumer product
(from Uni-News, 7 January 2010)

In the depths of the global crunch, why would anyone want to waste precious money on pointless junk that ends up in the trashcan after a couple of uses?

But sales of consumer nonsense are still rocketing - stuff such as wand-shaped TV remote controls, desk-top hoovers, and electric toothbrushes costing hundreds of pounds. Even a hollow plastic golf-club you can wee into while playing a round (don't show it to Tiger Woods, please). We're still madly addicted to consumption.

Despite the financial collapse, carbon emissions from fossil fuels rose by 2 per cent last year to an all-time, planet-melting high. Scientists in Nature Geoscience say that much of this was caused by Chinese exports of consumer gadgets to Europe.

So, welcome to the Landfill Prize 2010, a divertingly subversive initiative to help to break this costly cycle.

We want people's nominations for the most needless, wasteful uses of our planet's precious resources that they've seen, bought or been given in the past year. Whether it's an electronic skipping rope, an automatic cucumber peeler or a laser-guided pair of scissors, we want to spotlight such pointless ingenuity as it makes its fast-track journey to the junkheap. This year we're specially interested in 'faux' green goods.

The prize, to be presented to the 'winning' manufacturer in February, celebrates the stupendous creativity of the people tasked with inventing constantly inflated new wants for us to want. It's a monument to perverse imagination and needless consumption. Most importantly, it's a plea for us to say, "Thanks. We've got enough stuff," and to break free from this crazy cycle.

The Landfill Prize site features a list of scientifically backed ways in which you can help to proof your brain against consumerist chicanery, written by John Naish, a national newspaper health correspondent, the author of Enough, Breaking free from the world of more . and the man behind the prize.

Nominations will be judged by a panel consisting of:

• John Naish (author of Enough: Breaking free from the world of more )
• Anna Shepherd (author of How green are my wellies?)
• Carl Honore (author of In Praise of Slow )
• Ben Davis (co-founder of BuyLessCrap)

The winner will be announced on the 16th February 2010. We'll invite the makers along to a little prizegiving. and if they don't want to come, I guess we will have to pop around to their place to make the award.

For more information go to www.enoughness.co.uk

UKSpirituality is the most diverse and inclusive listing of high quality spirituality programmes and events currently happening across the entire United Kingdom. They vet each contribution to ensure it is non-dogmatic and participative and open to everyone regardless of age, race, ethnicity, ability or sexual orientation. Spirituality without conformity for people of all perspectives!

UKspirituality is an interfaith not-for-profit association dedicated to helping people live more enlightened, compassionate, mindful and joyful lives.

The network was founded by Unitarians, who take an eclectic and open-minded and inclusive approach to religion and spirituality. Because of this Unitarian inclusiveness, they are now an interfaith network comprising leaders, programmes, and events associated with many different religious, spiritual, and philosophical traditions.

Unitarian churches have a free pulpit and free pews:

There are two time honored institutions in Unitarian Universalist churches that are, or should be, guarded by clergy and laity as if they were the Holy Grail. They are the free pulpit and the free pew. Succinctly stated, the free pulpit means that when a congregation lends its pulpit to a minister by calling that minister as its spiritual leader, the congregation pledges complete and unencumbered freedom of speech to say anything from that pulpit that he or she believes to be true. But that freedom is not something the preacher is born with, but originates in the bond of affection, the covenant established between the congregation and the minister. The free pew means that when a Unitarian Universalist congregation is gathered by a bond of affection, a covenant that makes it into a spiritual community, the most sacred agreement made is that no theological test will be given for membership in that congregation.

A number of churches and ministers put their sermons and addresses online - it's a fantastic spiritual resource and a way to understand Unitarianism better.

• Blackpool Unitarians - sermons by Dr Martin Pulbrook and others
• Addresses by Yvonne Aburrow (Bristol Unitarians)
• Cambridge Unitarians - sermons by Rev Andrew Brown
• Kensington Unitarians - sermons by Rev Sarah Tinker and others
• Newington Green and Islington Unitarians - sermons by Rev Andrew Pakula
• Oxford Unitarians - sermons
• Richmond and Putney Unitarians - sermons by Rev Linda Hart

A tag cloud is a collection of keywords from your website or blog, or about a topic.

There are many tag cloud gadgets, but Wordle will create a tag cloud with both vertical and horizontal words, and offers customisation including changing the colours and the font.

Here is the tag cloud for the Unitarian Communications blog:


Wordle also lets you create a cloud of words that you have entered into a box, so you could create one with Unitarian values, or famous Unitarians, or whatever.

W Craig Tomlin at Useful Usability has compiled a list of 24 web site usability testing tools, starting with a pencil and paper, through to web statistics software, heat-maps, desktop software and online card-sorts. He gives a detailed explanation and evaluation of each tool, together with its pros and cons.

Many of these tools are free or reasonably cheap.

A series of leaflets is available about Unitarian views of various issues.

• Unitarianism - A faith worth thinking about
• Your first time at a Unitarian service? What to expect
• Namings and welcomings - the Unitarian way
• Weddings and same-sex blessings
• Funerals and memorial services - the Unitarian way
• Unitarian views of Jesus

Most people know that you must add alt text to images, for example:

<img src="http://www.blogger.com/myphoto.jpg" alt="The Nightingale Centre" />

But there are other things you need to add for full accessibility and usability.

You should set a height and width for your image (and this should be no greater than the actual height and width of the image).

<img src="http://www.blogger.com/myphoto.jpg" height="240" width="360" alt="The Nightingale Centre" />

If an image is very high resolution, it will take a while to download, so you should resize it to a smaller size in your graphics program before uploading it (don't just set a smaller height and width in your HTML).

Internet Explorer uses the alt text as a tooltip, which is actually incorrect. Firefox uses the title attribute as the tooltip text, which is correct. So, if you want the title of your image to be displayed when a Firefox user rolls his/her mouse over the image, you need to add a title attribute.

<img src="http://www.blogger.com/myphoto.jpg" height="240" width="360" alt="The Nightingale Centre" title="The Nightingale Centre" />

You should also ensure that you use the correct format for your images. JPG format should always be used for photos. PNG or GIF formats should always be used for other graphics, such as logos.

So you have produced a shiny new video for your website - but is it accessible?

Deaf viewers require captioning; blind users require audio descriptions, and mobility-impaired users require keyboard shortcuts for video controls.

The best free tool for making videos accessible is Media Access Generator (MAGpie) from NCAM.

Another option is to provide a transcript of your video content.

If you're using a table to present information, you need to make it readable from left to right so that it won't be inaccessible to people using screen readers.

Here's an example of a good table:

Name	Phone	Email
Joe Bloggs	0208 123 4567	jbloggs@gmail.com
Ann Other	0208 234 5678	annother@gmail.com
Fred Smith	0208 345 6789	fsmith@gmail.com

24 ways is the advent calendar for web geeks. Each day throughout December they publish a daily dose of web design and development goodness to bring you a little Christmas cheer.

Now all they need to do is find a way of sending chocolate through the internet...

There are two interesting Unitarian and UU blogposts about Advent:

• Advent – A Humanist Adventure (1984) from The Sermons and Musings of Carl J. Westman, DD.
• Celebrating Advent without misrepresentation, sentimentalism or parody (and a couple of recommended books) by Andrew Brown

And Stephen Lingwood has posted a video: Advent: How long shall we keep God waiting? It's very good.

Making your website accessible is very important. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines are the definitive guide to making your site accessible. There is also a checklist based on the guidelines produced by WebAIM.

Making your site accessible helps everyone, but especially users with visual or hearing impairments, and people with slow web connections.

A useful resource for understanding accessibility issues is Dive into accessibility, which presents a series of things you can do to make your website more accessible, and some case studies of people with disabilities.

There is also a selection of tools you can use to analyse your web pages for accessibility. These make the process very much easier - but they are no substitute for understanding accessibility and learning the basic accessibility guidelines.

The first thing to realise about writing for the web is that people tend to skim-read pages, looking for the salient facts. Therefore it is best to write in an inverted pyramid style, with the most important information and a summary of the article first. Another important guideline is to avoid information pollution (the inclusion of redundant information, like "don't use your hairdryer underwater").

Since people only skim-read on the web, it's a good idea to break your page up with headings, bullet points, and the use of bold to emphasise key points.

Stick to the main topic of the page (don't digress) and include only one idea per paragraph.

About.com has ten guidelines for web writing.

The importance of clear communication is obvious. But plain English is a specific style which can be learnt. The Plain English Campaign have a series of guides to writing plain English.

Some of the key guidelines are:

• avoid passive voice
• avoid long sentences with dependent clauses
• avoid jargon and non-literal phrases
• avoid excessive formality
• Try to expand acronyms (e.g. GA) and explain unfamiliar jargon the first time you use them
• If you are explaining a procedure, try to set it out in small steps in the same order as the person will need to carry out the procedure.
  
• Use numbers not words - it's better to use "23" than "twenty-three" as it stands out more
  

The easiest way to obtain accurate web statistics is to use Google Analytics.

The best place to start is the Get Started page on the Google Analytics site, which explains how to install tracking code and how to view your reports.

Once you have installed Analytics, all you have to do is check back every so often to see which pages are the most popular, and the number of visitors from different parts of the world.

What is information architecture?

1. The structural design of shared information environments.
2. The art and science of organising and labelling web sites, intranets, online communities and software to support findability and usability. » More

The information architecture of your website makes it easier for visitors to find information. A typical church website will have times of services, contact details, how to find the church/chapel, sample sermons, profiles of the members and the minister, newsletter articles, and so on.

There are several different models of information architecture.

• All-in-one - all the information on one page
• Flat - all pages are arranged as peers
• Index - like the flat structure, but with a table of contents
• Hub-and-spoke / Daisy - usually used for web applications
• Strict hierarchy - a system where you can only access a lower-level page via its parent
• Multi-dimensional hierarchy - more than one way of browsing to the same content
• Search - for websites with a lot of content

The information architecture is mainly represented by the navigation (menus).

The JISC Access Management blog has a useful evaluation of Google Sites, which they used to manage a website for a conference.

Key points to note: Ease of use and Look and feel.

Whilst Heal your church website is written mainly for evangelicals, it still has lots of great articles and information.

In computing, internationalisation and localisation are means of adapting computer software to different languages and regional differences. Internationalisation is the process of designing a software application so that it can be adapted to various languages and regions without engineering changes. Localization is the process of adapting software for a specific region or language by adding locale-specific components and translating text.

~ Wikipedia, Internationalisation and localisation

What to avoid

• Colloquialisms (slang)
• Non-literal phrases and expressions, e.g. "keeping us on our toes"
• Phrases from other languages such as Latin, French or German, e.g. lingua franca, Schadenfreude, viva voce, double entendre
• Excessive formality and convoluted sentences
• Passive voice
• Dependent clauses in sentences

What to consider

• If you're writing about "local" events or information, it's OK to use British English
• If you're writing about "international" events or information, it's better to use more generic English

There's an interesting post over at Yet Another Unitarian Universalist about the best way to treat different learning styles (visual, auditory and kinaesthetic) when teaching - the best way is to use the most appropriate modality for the material being delivered. This is interesting news for anyone who works in religious or other education, with adults or children.

When not to use PDFs

• If the information is intended to be read online
• If another content type could be used instead, i.e. a normal HTML web-page

When to use PDFs

• When a document needs to be downloaded, read offline or printed
• If a document is more than 5 pages long. But consider whether it could be broken down into smaller sections and presented as HTML
• When attaching a document to an email
• As an additional alternative to online content - e.g. this set of tutorials could also be provided as a single PDF document
• When formatting needs to be preserved - e.g. a PowerPoint presentation
• Instead of Microsoft Office documents. But HTML is better most of the time
• See the definitive list of when to use PDFs by Joe Clark

• An online HTML version or summary of the document
• A link to download Adobe Acrobat Reader
• A PDF icon to indicate that it is a PDF document (see an example on the BBC website)

See also

• Microsoft Office and PDF Document Guidelines
• Avoid PDF for on-screen reading (Jakob Nielsen)
• Facts and opinions about PDF accessibility (Joe Clark)

Why "Click here" is bad linking practice (by Jukka Korpela)

• "Click here" just looks stupid.
• "Click here" looks especially stupid when printed on paper.
• "Click here" is useless in a list of links or when in "links reading" mode, or whenever a link text is considered as isolated from its textual and visual context.
• "Click here" is bad food for search engines. If you say "For information on Unitarianism, click here", search engines won't know that your document contains a link to a document about Unitarianism. Some important search engines use the link text in estimating the relevance of a link. Using descriptive link texts thus helps users in finding documents they're interested in, potentially including your document due to a link text with some key word.
• There's usually a fairly simple way to do things better. Instead of the text "For information on Unitarianism, click here", you could simply type "About Unitarianism".
• "Click here" is device-dependent. There are several ways to follow a link, with or without a mouse. Users probably recognize what you mean, but you are still conveying the message that you think in a device-dependent way.

Describing links correctly

Bad

Good

Click here for information about Unitarianism You can access information on Unitarianism by clicking here More information on Unitarianism is here More information on Unitarianism is available by following this link More information on Unitarianism is available by following this link Follow this link for more information on Unitarianism www.unitarian.org.uk/ To book a place on this course click here

About Unitarianism More information about Unitarianism Find out more about Unitarianism There have been a lot of news items about Unitarianism recently Book a place on this course

For people who want to bring together different services to create a unique blend (also known as a mashup), there are some really useful and easy to use tools out there.

Widgetbox allows you to develop small applications for embedding in webpages. The easiest widget to set up is the blidget, which fetches an RSS feed (from a blog, news service such as the BBC or the University's News pages,del.icio.us tags, Yahoo! Pipe or Flickr) and creates a shiny widget for embedding in a web-page, or for turning into a Facebook application or Google gadget.

Yahoo! Pipes allow you to bring together (aggregate) several different RSS feeds, filter out duplicate items, add author information, and so on.

Flickr is an online photo storage site, where you can display your photos (either publicly or so that only friends and family can see them), and you can use advanced search to obtain photos for use in presentations and on websites under the Creative Commons licence.

del.icio.us is a social bookmarking site, which means it is like bookmarking a favourite page in your web browser, but the bookmarks are saved on the del.icio.us website, and tagged with labels to make them easier for you and others to find. Each page on del.icio.us (whether it's popular tags, all tags, your bookmarks, or one of your tags) has an RSS feed associated with it, which can then be imported to a blidget or an RSS reader.

Jotform is the first web based WYSIWYG form builder. Its intuitive drag and drop user interface makes form building a breeze. Using JotForm, you can create forms, integrate them to your site and collect submissions from your visitors.

Google Scholar provides a search of scholarly literature across many disciplines and sources, including theses, books, abstracts and articles. You still need an Athens account to log in to many of the resources you can find via Google Scholar, but it searches across all of JSTOR, Ebscohost, Blackwell Synergy, the DNB, Google Books, etc.

Google Books - Google have digitised many books libraries around the world. If the book is out of copyright, you can download the entire book, and search all of its content. Books that are still in copyright only allow a limited search. » More information

These are just two of the many tools offered by Google.

Twitter is a micro-blogging service where you can post links, quotes and items of interest without the need to write a full-size blogpost. Quite a number of UK Unitarians are on there already.

• Andy Pakula
• Vogelbeere
• Monastico
• fmcdancer
• Linda Hart

The International Council of Unitarians and Universalists (founded 1995) is a body devoted to fostering connections between Unitarian and Unitarian Universalist groups around the world. There are about 500,000 Unitarians and Universalists in the world today. Many belong to large church organizations while others rarely meet another Unitarian face-to-face. The oldest groups, who are Hungarian speaking, have a continuous church history of more than 400 years. Some of the English speaking groups go back over 200 years. Many of the newest member and emerging groups have a much shorter history.

The International Association for Religious Freedom (IARF) (founded 1901) is a UK-based charity working for freedom of religion & belief at a global level.

European Unitarian Universalists (founded 1982) is a support network and community for Unitarian Universalists (UUs) and UU fellowships in Europe.

Unitarians in other countries
A - F
G - O
P - Z

Many Unitarian Universalists have blogs, and there is more than one blog aggregator for them. (A blog aggregator is a site that gathers content from other blogs - just a snippet of the text, the title and a link, and not the whole blog post, as that would be plagiarism.)

Unitarian Universalist blog aggregators:

• UUpdates.net: the latest content from many UU blogs and websites
• Philocrites' annotated guide to UU blogs
• UU World: weekly round-up of blog posts
• Discover UU: blogs section - imports snippets of many UU blogs

There are many Unitarian websites at national, regional and local levels. Here's how to find your way around them.

National level
The General Assembly website has recently been re-launched. It has resources for congregations and explains Unitarianism for inquirers. The General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches is the body in which all Unitarians unite.

Unitarians in the UK & Ireland is a resource about and for Unitarians. It also offers a free website template for Unitarian communities that don't currently have one. It explains what Unitarianism is and how to find Unitarians.

There are several Unitarian societies covering special interests such as music, earth spirituality, history, meditation, peace, all of which have their own website.

There are various commissions, including the Engagement Groups Support Panel, which encourages the development of engagement groups.

Regional level
Most districts have their own website.

Local level
Most churches have their own websites, and you can find these using either the congregation finder on the General Assembly website, or the map of congregations on the Unitarians in UK & Ireland website.

The National Unitarian Fellowship are hosting an excellent series of videos about Unitarianism, introducing it, explaining Unitarian values, the Unitarian relationship with the Christian tradition, what a Unitarian service is like, Unitarian social responsibility, and how Unitarianism is organised.There are also personal views of Unitarianism from Tony McNeile, Jane Barraclough, Hazel Clarke, Stephen Lingwood and Jef Jones.

There is also a UK Unitarian channel on YouTube.

There are many Unitarian Universalist blogs and several blog aggregators (sites which bring UU blogs together). There are also several Unitarian bloggers in the British Isles.

Bill Darlison has a blog where he posts his sermons (he updates it regularly but he is using it more as a website than a blog); Stephen Lingwood blogs at Reignite; Andrew Brown blogs at Caute, and Yvonne Aburrow blogs at dance of the elements. If there are any other British or Irish Unitarian bloggers out there, let us know and we'll add your blog to the sidebar.

Belief-O-Matic
Many Unitarian websites link to the Belief-O-Matic questionnaire. This is a questionnaire which asks about your views on life, ethics, spirituality, religion, the divine, and so on, and works out what religion you are by comparing you to other people who have answered the questionnaire in the past. One example of a church with a link to the questionnaire is Rosslyn Hill Chapel in London; another is Bristol Unitarians.

Photo-sharing
Another useful gadget is the Flickr badge, which enables you to display photos uploaded to Flickr (a photo sharing website). Of course you will need some digital photos and a Flickr account first. Once you have joined Flickr, be sure to join the UK Unitarians group and add your photos to the group pool. You can also use photos from Flickr for your website, as long as they are shared via Creative Commons.

Interactive maps
The Unitarians in the UK & Ireland website has a map of all the Unitarian congregations in the UK, and you can zoom in to a region and see all the chapels in that area. You can also embed a chunk of Google map in your website to show where your chapel or church is. See the Bristol Unitarians 'how to find us' page for an example, and Google Help for instructions.

Who has visited
The best tool to use to find out how many people have visited your site is Google Analytics. This is not a web counter, it is a proper statistical application which is very easy to use and produces maps and graphs of your visitors. Don't use web counters - these are notoriously inaccurate, and make your site look amateur.

Another tool that is quite nice is the MyBlogLog Recent Readers widget. This shows when registered MyBlogLog users have visited your blog or wiki. I wouldn't recommend having a guestbook as these are highly vulnerable to spam.

Video
Youtube Videos - Some congregations have created videos and slideshows that have now been put onto Youtube. You can embed video in your own website.

Creative collaboration
Another option is to have a wiki where people can post church-related discussions, activities such as engagement groups, coffee rotas etc. Cambridge Memorial Unitarian Church has a wiki (NB this is not intended to replace their main church website).

Some churches (such as Bristol Unitarians) use a blog as a "poor person's content management system"; others use Google Sites (such as New Unity). This enables multiple contributors to the website, and doesn't necessarily mean that editors need to know HTML, though it does mean they need to be confident with online editing tools (which are usually WYSIWYG).

The Communications Commission met yesterday and decided to have a blog to share good practice and useful resources. Blogging is a great way of communicating and sharing ideas, and we want to encourage more Unitarians to start blogging. Blogging is a way of sharing ideas and thoughts, poetry, sermons, and conversation.

There are many people out there who may well be Unitarians without knowing it - in other words, they already share our outlook on life, the universe and everything, and may be looking for a community to share their spiritual life with, but have never heard of Unitarianism.