by Bob Gersztyn
ONLINE EXTRA June 2005

Where ya gonna go, if you wanna discuss orthodox postmillenialist preterism, of the molinist persuasion, while at the same time avoiding extreme sectarianism?You could try The Wittenburg Door's Chat closet, or the most off-beat theology debate web site currently on the internet, www.theologyweb.com. Door contributing editor, Bob Gersztyn, interviewed Dee Dee Warren, who one of the head honchos and avatar of theologyweb.com. Ms. Warren is a rarity in the theological debate arena, because of being a female with the ability to shred her opponents arguments. Paradoxically, she considers herself to be conservative and non-egalitarian in her theological world. She works as a legal assistant by day, and was a member of a "Thrash Metal" band prior to becoming a Christian. After debating the lyrics in the latest "Anthrax" album, Bob and Dee Dee stopped long enough to do this interview.

WITTENBURG DOOR: Why don't we start by having you explain what theologyweb.com is.
DEE DEE WARREN: What we've really tried to create is a very attractive environment, where there's a lot of community, and friendship, and long-term things that happen amongst people with very diverse points of view, even though our ultimate goal is the promotion of Christianity. We've really opened the doors, and welcomed, from the most extreme Atheists, to the most Fundamentalist Christian. Sometimes it can be very hard to communicate very succinctly, or accurately, in the type of environment that we have.
      One thing is that we try not to take ourselves too seriously, even though we're sometimes addressing serious subjects. That's what I like, particularly about The Door Magazine a lot, is that it kept some of the silliness that we do, as Christians, it just really exposes it for what it is. We do a lot of satire, and things like that on the site. When unbelievers come into our environment, they say you're Christians, your not supposed to be doing that, maybe you're not supposed to be joking, or having fun, whatever. They're shocked that we're cutting loose like that. I think that we've had to dispel a lot of that. We've shown that you can be pretty zany, and wacky, and have a lot of fun, and still be a follower of Christ, and not fear the tough, aggressive questions.
DOOR: How did the idea for "Theologyweb.com" come about?
WARREN: It kind of just happened quickly and without much planning, actually.. I have been a lover of Internet debate forums ever since I discovered there was such a thing, and made some very dear friends over the years. Upheavals are part of forum life, and after one such event at another forum, Tweb was formed with two of my best friends, and things just kind of blossomed, both with the forum, and the close friendship the three of us enjoy. We were pretty excited about using our experiences of what we liked and didn't like about other places and discovered that we really did have a niche idea to fill a void that we just didn't think was covered by other forums in the way we envisioned.
DOOR: Why do you think that theologyweb.com is having the success it does?
WARREN: It's all about the dancing bananas. That is not actually too far from the truth. We have brought, much like The Door, a great deal of fun into theology, and don't take ourselves too seriously. I asked our membership what made us unique and successful, and one of the best answers was that the Owners who have provided a superior environment in design and programming, attempt to have a pretty even level of moderation that does not seek to enforce an artificial level of behavior, and then just let the widely diverse membership fill in the details. While we as leadership are unabashedly pretty conservative in our Christian theology and worldview, we encourage the free expression and debate of almost any point of view. All are welcome, and hopefully, most feel that way. We attempt to not have an "in" group, nor simply favor the Christians at all costs. I think that was demonstrated when our membership voted an atheist member as our first Alumnus of the Year. In short I guess, there is an overwhelming sense of community, and that is what we wanted to build.
DOOR: Why has Theologyweb.com experienced the growth that it has?
WARREN: Again, I think it is the genuine sense of community, and the high level of scholarship that can be found amongst our lay membership. Our slogan is "We Debate Theology. Seriously!" which is both true and tongue in cheek. There are some hard-hitting theology debates going in with information that rivals seminary level discourse, including having various experts posting on the site from fields, as different as physics and chemistry, to New Testament, and Old Testament studies. But at the same time, there is just some downright theology silliness, such as the spoof Official TheologyWeb Cult, The True List, complete with apostates, prophets, and doctrinal schisms. Stuff like that just happens routinely. Our members are fun, and the leadership gets right in the fray, and are not the "untouchables." Theologyweb is growing fast because we merge intellectually stimulating discussion on a wide array of topics with fun and fellowship, surrounded by a beautiful setup. Frankly, it's addictive.
DOOR: Do sites like yours generate any revenue?
WARREN: Yes, for our server host (who has been wonderful to us), and Google. Oh, you mean for us? No, we don't make any profit from the site.
DOOR: So then how does your site pay for itself?
WARREN: Right now we have a contributor base that pays for about 70 percent of our operating expenses with the rest being funded personally by the Site Owners.
DOOR: What would you say is the main purpose for the site?
WARREN: The pat Christian answer is, "To glorify Christ and further His Kingdom," and yes, that ultimately is our goal. But more specifically, as stated in our Mission Statement, our goal is to encourage discussion, promote growth from the knowledge shared amongst participants, and have free, and open debate in the marketplace of ideas as we believe Christianity is logically, and intellectually defensible. Our forum is in an open form and dedicated to open discussion from varying points of views, and interests, some of which may be considered controversial.
      One thing that we felt very strongly about was, to have a wide representation of various views, and sub-views, of Christian doctrine, that fits into orthodoxy, in that none of the essentials of the faith are denied. Many forums are run by those of a particular persuasion, and the in-crowd is of that particular persuasion. At Tweb, our leadership disagree quite strongly with each other on issues of nonsalvational importance, but yet still operate very closely as brethren. That in itself is monumental. Amongst our leadership we have dispensationalists, Calvinists, Arminians, Molinists, Open View theists, preterists, futurists, young-earth creationists, theistic evolutionists, Protestants and Eastern Orthodox to name just some of the spectrum. Yet we get along in our disagreement.
DOOR: What is your ultimate goal for the site?
WARREN: To take over the world and hide our weapons of mass destruction. Along the way, we are hoping, and planning to expand into not just a forum, but a comprehensive resource for theology research. So many forums have so much great information that is written and posted but very few have any way to really catalog and reference this wealth of knowledge. So, currently, our highly skilled flying programming monkeys are also hard at work inventing several new dimensions of the site.
DOOR: The internet seems to be developing an entirely new avenue for religious expression, through sites like Theologyweb.com, do you think that it will eventually play as important a part as television?
WARREN: For me, the Internet in general already has. I could throw the TV set in the lake of fire and not miss it. I do know that with theological issues and research the Net has blossomed and is both valuable and "dangerous" for the exact same reasons. Getting material published can be very difficult and expensive, but with the Net almost anyone can get their ideas and research out there to a world-wide audience who can access it cheaply. This has led to a wealth of information being available, but also contributed to some very poor research and downright heresy being readily available that would never have passed any kind of publishing review, or been profitable to mass-produce. I own another site, The PreteristSite (preteristsite.com) which exists to provide a non-heretical source to study preterism as most of what is found on the Internet on that subject is unfortunately completely outside the historic faith.
DOOR: How did you first become interested in religion?
WARREN: My whole life I had been interested in "spirituality" and floated from occultism and paganism to everything in between. I became a Christian soon after my mother died, partly as a result of a deathbed promise I had made to her to go to her Church, that she had been inviting me too, for some time. My mother and I were extraordinarily close, but oddly enough, this closeness made me very stubbornly proud, and as long she was alive, I doubt I ever would have given Christianity a serious thought. The night I made the promise to her, she died. After my conversion, I studied the scriptures and theology vociferously, and here I am. I love God, and talking/debating about God.
DOOR: What is your religious affiliation?
WARREN: I currently attend a nondemoninational church though I am actively exploring other options as God leads in different directions, but cannot say that my particular doctrinal positions fit the mold of any major denomination. As you know, I am an orthodox preterist which right there narrows things down a LOT, and then I am also postmillennial, but molinist. There are not too many of us around. To say that I have a passion for all things eschatological would not be an overstatement.
DOOR: Uh, could you explain what an orthodox preterist, who is also a postmillennialist, of the molinist persuasion is, for those readers who may not be as theologically informed as, um, The Door staff?
WARREN: Ahh, I couldn't wait for you to ask! Okay, here is the skinny. An orthodox preterist is someone who holds that MOST of the "end times" passages in the Bible were fulfilled in the first century, most notably the Great Tribulation (this is in opposition to hyperpreterists, a heretical view that believes that ALL is fulfilled, including the resurrection). I would hold that the Great Tribulation is a completely past event and has no reference, except as possibly typological of God's patterns of judgment, for our future.
      Postmillennialism refers to the timing of Christ's Second Advent as well as the nature of the "millennial kingdom." I hold that Christ returns AFTER the "Millennium," thus, the "post" designation, which would invariably mean that the "millennium" is a present and progressive reality. This is very similar to amillennialism, except to the extent that I believe as a postmill that the Kingdom will be expressed on earth over the course of a long period of time in increased righteous and Gospel blessing, not decadence and Gospel defeat. So I hold the very rare view that Christ will return to an earth populated primarily by Christians, not nonbelievers.
      Lastly, Molinism is a soteriological (how God saves, elects, and foreknows) view, much like Calvinism or Arminianism. Molinists hold that before Creation, God knew all possible worlds that He could create, and exactly what free choices His creatures would make in each of those possible worlds. He then chooses to actualize one of those possible worlds, thus predestining but retaining Libertarian free will. It of course gets more philosophically complex than that, but there you go.
DOOR: That you for clearing that up. I think. What type of post secondary education do you have?
WARREN: I'm a legal assistant by day, and have a degree in that field, but I don't have any formal training in theology. All I have learned has been through my church and a program of self-study. I do hope to go to Seminary, and was in fact accepted at Southern Evangelical Seminary, but then TheologyWeb happened and those plans have been put on hiatus.
DOOR: How does TheologyWeb.com differ from other religious forums?
WARREN: I certainly think it is a whole lot wackier while still maintaining scholarship. We have tried to have a light moderating touch, allowing the members mostly to police themselves, but not so light that pandemonium results.
DOOR: An obvious question that arises from your high-profile involvement with Theologyweb.com is, how do view the current place that women hold in church leadership?
WARREN: The majority of the leadership is of a very conservative Christian world view. I'm not only talking about conservative theologically, but even politically. Although that's not a requirement to be a moderator, we do have some socially, or politically liberal moderators as well, but as a whole the leadership is pretty conservative both theologically, and politically. I think that this is interesting, in that a reader, such as myself, and I'm extremely conservative, enjoys a magazine like The Wittenburg Door. The Door is probably the only magazine, where I'm laughing hysterically, one page, and then the next page when you guys lampoon one of my sacred cows, I go, "Hey, that's not funny." It's always good to have your own point of view put under the satirical looking glass. That makes for a very unusual pairing, and is something that I wanted to bring out, and you reminded me of that with the female church leadership question. It may surprise you to learn that my particular theological point of view, is that I do not support female lead pastors, and that's unusual considering that I'm such an outspoken female, and I'm a female leader, but this is a forum board and not a church meeting. I'm not currently an egalitarian, when it comes to women's roles in the church, which you might find unusual, though my views on that have been changing somewhat to a more moderate position as I have been studying the view of others. I find it a very interesting issue, and debate within the church.
DOOR: What function do you play in the site's management?
WARREN: I provide oversight for the "people factor," such as site politics and moderating issues, with our two forum Administrators and upper leadership volunteers. The other two owners concentrate on all aspects of site design and programming and, of course, we all three decide overall site direction.
DOOR: The site is so big, and complex, that it almost seems overwhelming, compared to simpler chat rooms, like The Door's chat closet. Have you had any other comments on this?
WARREN: It is certainly a universe unto itself. In these more complex and interactive and visually stimulating forums, people can spend great amounts of time online and be educated and entertained very easily. Also, the real live community feel is much easier to maintain with things such as the chat box on each page and personalize posts with avatars, signature lines, and other personal touches. But for some people, all the "bells and whistles" are overwhelming, and they prefer something more simple. We have tried to cater to that crowd as well with different "versions" of TWeb being available such as TheologyWeb Lite which is a scaled down version that also is great for our dial-up members.
      Speaking, though, of "versions," we have several others to choose from – including one done almost entirely in pink and flowers for the ladies. Now come on! What other theology site does that? And don't forget the "bratz" design for the inevitable forum crybabies!
DOOR: Aren't you afraid that by open discussion, including all faiths, and belief systems, that some will be led astray?
WARREN: The Apostle Paul wasn't. He boldly went into places where other faiths and beliefs were practiced and challenged them with the truth of Christianity. I do not think over-sheltering is the answer to keeping faith. Our faith is defensible, and there are real objections that people have, that we need to be able to answer. Too often I see an over sheltering of Christians into their own ghetto subculture so that we become completely weird and can't relate to the lost. I guess a lot of this question has to do with one's belief on salvation. And that, of course, is open to debate. Want to start a thread on it?
DOOR: We'll ask the questions during this interview, thank you. How big is the site, in megabytes?
WARREN: It's over a thousand (1000 megs = a gigabyte). We very quickly grew to require our own dedicated server to host the site.
DOOR: Do you ever delete posts, after a period of time?
WARREN: We do in the "spam" areas (i.e., the fun and goofy areas), but not in the theology debate areas. We have a ton of memory to burn and hope to only have to prune (i.e. delete posts), after a very long period of time. We have a function to "archive" very good threads, so that they will never be deleted.
DOOR: How many posts per week does "Theologyweb" get on the average?
WARREN: We have been averaging almost 8,000 posts per week.
DOOR: !!! By my own posting, I've discovered that monitors are quick to move your post from one area to the next, or chastise you if they feel it's inappropriate.
WARREN: As you know, we are a very active site so that maintaining order is a delicate balance. We are quick to move, or discipline when necessary, but this is done, more to educate the members on what is acceptable, so that further intervention is not needed in the future. We really want to moderate as little as possible, but we have an extensive and dedicated staff to keep things to a dull roar for the benefit of the entire community.
DOOR: Do you know how many different people have visited the site since its inception?
WARREN: Hmm, not since the inception, but we had 8.6 million hits in Dec, 14 million in Jan, 13.6 million in Feb and so far in March 13.4 million. That does not necessarily translate into different people, but does give you an idea of our activity level. And to think that we thought when we started, that a $15 a month shared server, was going to be all we needed for at least a year!
DOOR: Hold on one minute, you said that you get millions of hits per month. Is the number correct, because it's incredibly high, and you said that you get 8,000 hits per week earlier.
WARREN: I'm sorry that I got confusing in switching the foundational parameters. The 8k was a post count, and the "millions" was hits.(Editor's note: The number of times a page was loaded regardless of whether or not it is a new user or new IP address.) So, when Bob and Joe come on to the site, and load 500 pages each and post twice, it would only register as two posts 8K count. But, in the hits count, this would be 1,000 hits right there.
DOOR: How many members do you have?
WARREN: Currently we have over 6,700 people who have taken the plunge, and actually gone through the initiation ceremony, which is quite a lot, considering all the beatings you must endure to become a member. We have never really kept track of this, but there are countless unknown lurkers that don't post, and don't register. The best guess we have is the 6,700, but that is just those that have decided to register, many more visit the site without registering so we really have no idea. This was done in just over two years, without having an underlying ministry of our own to draw from – though we have received tremendous support from Tekton Apologetics Ministry – nor having merged with any other site. Many sites take over five years to get to where we are at. Of course I am biased, but for a forum truly built from the ground up by three best friends that had no plans to do such a thing, we are excited beyond belief and praising God for what He has blessed us with, as the fruit of our hard work.