Last night I attended a cookout for our seminarians and seminary staff, at the dean’s home. The food was very good, and of course I ran away as soon as the eating was over and the time for fellowship was to begin, because a) that’s the way I am, and b) it was getting chilly and I’d forgotten to bring a jacket (despite the fact that the invitation expressly said to bring one).

Anyway, before the food was served I got into a conversation with one of the students. I asked him what he was doing for the summer. He told me he was working at home, helping to administrate a web project called Door 43.

You can examine it yourself here, but as I understand it, the idea is to provide an open-source, creative commons deposit of ministry and discipleship literature for Christians in the Third World.

His brother, a missionary, got the idea, he said, because he’d noticed that people in the remotest parts of Africa (and other places in the world) may not have running water, or regular internet access, but they have cell phones. He dreamed of providing Christian literature in these people’s languages, which they can read on their phones.

He approached various Bible and Christian publishers and found himself stymied by copyright laws. Various individuals told him they hailed his effort, and wished him well, but they were obligated to protect the copyrights on the literary property in their care.

So they decided to create a wiki (in two stages, so that it can’t be casually altered like Wikipedia). People who join the process will be able to help build up a library of creative commons material which can be accessed at no cost. They’re even working on Bible translations.

I got the impression that if you’re interested in this project, and have needed skills (language skills especially), they’d be happy to hear from you. I don’t know how far afield from Lutheranism they mean to go. You’d have to inquire about that.