Hundreds of faithful Orthodox Christians in Russia have signed up to a
new service to receive "sacred texts" -- short messages from the Bible
sent to their mobile phones.
Nearly 3,000 subscribers have signed
up for the service that sends excerpts from the Bible and other
religious works, said Father Iosaph Sorokin of Voskresenie
(Resurrection), the Moscow-based Orthodox youth group that launched the
service last month.
"This is an opportunity to remind people of
eternal values," he told AFP on Sunday, as new requests for
subscriptions arrived on his mobile phone.
The project, dubbed the
"Kind Word", offers the text messages for free and can be signed up to
by sending a message to the group.
"We would like the subscription
to grow, especially in Siberia and the Far East," said Sorokin, adding
that uplifting text messages could help residents of Russia's remote
regions in their daily lives.
Other religious groups have also
co-opted modern technologies to reach out to the faithful with, for
example, Roman Catholic mobile phone users in Europe able to subscribe
to receive messages of daily guidance from the Pope.
The Russian
Orthodox Church has enjoyed a renaissance since the 1991 collapse of the
officially atheist Soviet Union, with the Kremlin vigorously promoting
ties between the Church and state.