We’ve decided to have the Default Status for new users to this site set as Contributor. This means that when you Register for this site, you will then be able to login and write posts and begin to contribute your original content to this site.

After we meet with some presbymergents at the Mainline Emergent/s event at Columbia Theological Seminary, and after we talk with some more people about this site, there will be a group of people selected to be Editors for this site. It will be their job to login at least once a week and review content that people have submitted to be posted. They will then publish the content. Once we decide on appropriate guidelines for submitting content to Presbymergent.org, we will post that. Until then – feel free to begin submitting content, posts, discussion topics to the site.

The site has been live for just over 24hrs at this point, and we already have eight people who have subscribed to the site and it’s gotten mentioned a few times around the web today. If you’re a blogger, please spread the word about the site so we can continue to grow a strong group of users to help provide quality content to this site.

We’re still thinking about the best way to handle users and posting. Ideally, we’d like everyone to be able to contribute content to the site. I think it is important to recognize that this is site for people connected both to the Emergent movement and to the Presbyterian Church (USA), so I think we’d like to keep the posting to those who are PCUSAers (though we’re open to having guests posters). We may set it so that when someone registers, they automatically become a Contributor, meaning they can write and submit content to the site, but that it just has to be approved by an Editor. Or we may just open it up, make everyone Editors and see what happens. As I mentioned before, Karen Sloan and I just came up with the idea for the site yesterday and haven’t had time to think through all of the implications for it. There will be a large group of Presbyterians at the Mainline Emergent/s event at Columbia Seminary next week, so we may have a conversation to see what people would like to see with a site like this.

At any rate, this is just to let you know we are still figuring things out. For myself, I’d love to see this place become a place of conversation and discussion, a resource center for people involved in the conversation and a place of support for those who are struggling with remaining Presbyterian despite their “emergent leanings.” I’ve heard comments from many who are still in the church, but who secretly have been reading McLaren books, that they feel alone and even that some people tell them that they’re not “Reformed enough.” I would hope that this would be a place where they would feel welcome.

Anyway – keep spreading the word about Presbymergent and we’ll continue to work on the site.