VRCHAT — Stewart Freeman converted to Christianity after weekly Bible readings with a pastor in VRChat and subsequently joined Cru's Jesus Film Project. Freeman, who had logged over 10,000 hours in the social virtual reality platform, began receiving visits from Jason Poling, a pastor from Cornerstone Church in California, who read the Bible to him in his VRChat home world.

Freeman stated that this marked the first time he believed the gospel. "As crazy as it sounds, God used virtual reality to call someone into that space to lay out the gospel in its fullness," Freeman said.

Following his conversion, Freeman sold his business and relocated to Orlando to work for Cru's Jesus Film Project. He expressed a desire to engage with individuals in virtual spaces. Freeman said, "One of the main things that's nearest and dearest to my heart is stepping into the darkest of those places, of getting to know the individuals in that space, growing in relationship with them, and then pointing them to the answer that they're searching for."

Christian missionaries from Cru have been gathering every Friday in VRChat for three years. Heidi Campbell, a professor at Texas A&M University who specializes in digital religion, noted that efforts to train Christians for online evangelism began in the 1990s when the Billy Graham Foundation started instructing Christians on how to initiate discussions in online chat rooms.

Campbell remarked on the perception of digital spaces in evangelism. "It's the work of seeing these digital spaces as, like, the new religious frontier for evangelism in many respects," Campbell said. She also acknowledged a common criticism, stating, "I think that's one of the big criticisms, that people come in and try to kind of take over and turn it into something it's not." A discussion on the VRChat subreddit regarding the presence of Christians there generated nearly 200 comments.

Curt Curtis, a Christian missionary from Texas in his 60s, also participates in virtual outreach. Cru, originally founded in 1951 as Campus Crusade for Christ, has historically focused on evangelism and discipleship among college students and young people. Frank Kuligowski, the digital strategist for Cru, initiated the idea for Cru missionaries to acquire VR headsets for this purpose.

Why It Matters

This development signifies an expansion of traditional missionary work into virtual environments such as VRChat, a social platform where users interact using avatars. The conversion of a VRChat user like Stewart Freeman, and his subsequent involvement with Cru's Jesus Film Project, demonstrates how the organization is leveraging digital spaces for its evangelical objectives. This engagement reflects a broader trend of religious groups utilizing online platforms for outreach, a practice that has evolved since the 1990s.

The presence of missionary groups in virtual reality environments has also generated discussion within these online communities, as evidenced by user comments on platforms like the VRChat subreddit. This highlights both the opportunities and the potential social dynamics that arise when religious evangelism intersects with established online communities.