Google Technology Helps Put Faith on the Map
A Google Maps-powered database organizing thousands of faith groups working for progressive causes was launched Thursday.
The "Mapping Faith" database containing some 3,000 organizations in all 50 states was created in response to the increasingly religious-focused political season. Organizers and participants hope the database will show lawmakers and presidential candidates the concerns of people of faith including poverty, human rights, the environment, and immigration.
"In recent times we have come to be concerned about the way in which religion has been used as a divisive voice focus on select moral issue that tends to divide," said the Rev. Mark Diemer, Mapping Faith user and covener of We Believe Ohio – an interfaith social justice group .
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David Buckley, principle author of the Mapping Faith report, explained that a goal of the project is to document the diverse faith activism nationwide and help network faith advocacy groups.
The online database uses Google Maps technology to help users identify and locate 3,000 groups organizing around more than a dozen "progressive" causes.
Buckley said there is no "litmus test" to what organization can be considered progressive, but rather the participating faith groups all share the feeling of being "moved by their deepest faith commitment to advocate for progressive causes."
"It is my faith that is the impetus and motivation that leads me to advocate for God's creation," said Allen Johnson, founder of Christians for the Mountains in Dunmore, W. Va.
Christians for the Mountains is a Mapping Faith participant and is a Christian environmental advocacy group focused on the healing and restoration of the Appalachian Mountains region.
"What we need to do is help the churches to draw upon the depths of their biblical and theological resources and re-envision and re-energize them to act," Johnson said.
Religion and moral issues linked to faith groups have played an increasingly prominent role in the presidential candidate debates. Candidates from both parties have recently been speaking more openly about their faith and how it influences their decisions. Furthermore, Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) have both hired strategists to focus on reaching religious voters, according to The Associated Press. Clinton and Obama were also part of a progressive Christian forum on faith and poverty hosted by Sojourners earlier this month.
During the compilation of the Mapping Faith database, organizers said they discovered key findings about the nation's faith advocacy groups including: the faith community and their advocacy causes are tremendously diverse, poverty and human rights are the largest advocacy causes, and there is a growing evangelical activism on a broad range of issues.
"We hope this project is an important step in a growing, resurging and re-emergent of progressive faith advocacy," Buckley said.
The database is searchable by issue focus, state, and zip code.
On the web: faithinpubliclife.org
