Honoring the Poor by Giving them a Voice
We often interpret the “Body of Christ” passage as meaning “everyone has a role” in the Kindom of God, but when I read it, I take it to mean “everyone should have equal access to the Kindom of God.”
“Those members we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor…whereas our more respectable members do not need this”
This fits with Jesus’ ministry of clothing the poor, of giving them dignity in the face of humiliation, through acts of healing, advocacy, and spiritual protection. Whereas Jesus often required those of means to sacrifice them in order to demonstrate faith.
The way we honor the poor, the least respectable among us, through the internet is by keeping it open and free. While not perfect, this has proven to give the poor and their advocates a relatively larger voice since the inception of the internet.
Empowering Evangelism
Churches produce lots of data intensive media that is easy to distribute through the internet. Don’t think for a minute that we’ll be able to compete with the likes of television networks when are are forced to pay more or else have our data throttled. The Great Commission requires that we make “disciples of all nations in Jesus’ name”. Nothing reaches “all nations” easier than the internet. Let’s not throttle Jesus, shall we.
Promoting Religious Freedom
Those with strongly held religious beliefs that are in the minority (think the Pro-Life movement, for example) will undoubtedly find it harder to get their message out there when a corporation or corporate owner doesn’t like what you have to say are doesn’t want any boat-rocking on their networks or sites. You might have to pay-to-play or be censored outright. This happens now on other mediums. If a television network doesn’t like your political ad they can simply tell you they won’t run it. An ISP will be able to tell you the same thing about your church website through their network. Net Neutrality keeps this sort of thing from happening.
Those three are the main reasons I think we should be engaged on this issue.