It's less a matter of C of E than C of e-.

A report published by the Church of England has given Christians advice on how they should behave on the internet.

And it also raises questions about the new moral challenges facing society as more of it shifts into cyberspace.

Just as railways changed people's lives, and gave rise to new moral decisions, so the internet is doing exactly the same "before our eyes", says the report, Cybernauts Awake.

Good netiquette

The report, which is also published online, has some very simple suggestions for civilised behaviour. For example, don't send angry e-mails to people who have annoyed you (flaming), and be gracious if someone flames you.

Use smileys if you are trying to be funny, just in case someone misinterprets your attempt and is offended.

And, if you are a "techie" or system designer, think of your user as yourself. They should think: "How would I feel if I, my spouse, my children, my parents or best friend were on the receiving end of this system."

Bigger picture

And there are bigger questions too. Christians should use the internet to promote social justice, the report says. They should "seek the common good" by, for example, promoting economically responsible causes such as fair trade.

The Church's report

They should post explicitly Christian content - "if we each do a bit, the result is significant". They should participate in online debates so that Christian voices are heard.

There are also social justice implications - what about the information poor? How will those who cannot afford internet access let alone computers fare in a world where so much happens in cyberspace?

Bigger picture still

But there are also deeper philosophical issues. For instance, does cyberspace change our perception of sprituality?

Like cyberspace, spirituality is an intangible, abstract concept. The analogy between the two may even cause non-believers to think again, it says.

A central Christian belief is to love one's neighbour, which according to the parable of the Good Samaritan did not just mean people who live next door to you. But who is your neighbour in cyberspace?

Professor Simon Peyton-Jones, who co-wrote the report, which takes its name from an 18th Century carol Christians Awake!, said: "What is clear is that there are significant ethical and spiritual implications and that people need to think about these in the new cyber-dimension of the world that we are creating."

Ship of Fools, given new life by net

Many Christians already make full use of the internet, with sites offering Bible verses, online prayer requests, and publicity for individual churches.

But the attempt to define a Christian response to cyberspace was welcomed by Steve Goddard, from the acclaimed satirical Christian magazine Ship of Fools.

He said the church's role had always been to try to apply principles to the times, and the internet age was no different.

Ship of Fools has felt the impact of the internet in more ways that one - most notably that having existed as a print magazine since the 1970s, it shut down, only to re-open online 15 years later.

Mr Goddard said the magazine's bulletin board had suffered from people flaming it, leading to the creation of their own "Ten Commandments".

(They include "Thou shalt try to stick to the point" and "Thou shalt bear in mind that on a text-based system, tones of voice and shades of meaning are not always apparent".)

And their experience does have a bearing on another issue raised by the report - whether the church could in fact become an online community.

A poll of Ship of Fools readers earlier this year, found that nearly half believed it could become a fully fledged church, even though its readers are spread around the world.

Limitations of cyberspace

One thing you cannot do in cyberspace is to meet in person, of course, and this would mean that an online church would not take the place of traditional churches, he said.

The Cybernauts report exhorts people to pray "for and in cyberspace". Praying for cyberspace is conceivable, as is sending prayers through cyberspace. But how could one pray in cyberspace?

Sending an e-mail to God, as the illustration above suggests, would surely be to miss the report's point.