Alexandria, USA - Kyle Lewis, 25, missed going to church one Sunday last month. But he did not miss the sermon.
Lewis, who regularly attends services of the National Community Church in Alexandria, Virginia, listened to the sermon while he was at the gym, through a recording he had downloaded to his iPod. Instead of listening to the rock music his gym usually plays, he heard his pastor's voice.
"Having an iPod is a guaranteed way to get the sermon if you're going to be out of town," Lewis said, adding that he normally listened to the pastor's podcast at least once more during the week, usually while driving to work, even if he attended the service.
Lewis's pastor, the Reverend Mark Batterson, started podcasting, or "godcasting" as he prefers to call it, last month to spread the word about his congregation. The hourlong recordings of his weekly service, available on theaterchurch.com, have already brought new parishioners to his church, he said.
"I can't possibly have a conversation with everyone each Sunday," he said. "But this builds toward a digital discipleship. We're orthodox in belief but unorthodox in practice."
Just as Christian organizations embraced radio and television, podcasting has quickly caught on with religious groups. Since the beginning of July, the number of people or groups offering spiritual and religious podcasts listed on Podcast Alley (podcastalley.com) has grown to 474 from 177.
"Basically, every church can have its own radio show," Batterson said.
Sending spiritual messages over the airwaves is nothing new. The Vatican made its first radio broadcast in 1931 and today offers worldwide programming in 34 languages and some programs as podcasts, as well.
Evangelical Christians in the United States turned first to radio to spread their message, then to television. In the process, they built institutions like the Christian Broadcasting Network, headed by the Reverend Pat Robertson, and the Trinity Broadcast Network.
New technology like podcasting updates the mission, although on a much smaller scale for now. But Batterson said he believed that podcasting would have an impact on the church as profound as that of the printing press when the first Bibles were printed in the 15th century.
"If you really believe in the message you're preaching, you want as many people as possible to listen," he said.
Batterson said he liked the idea of "spiritual multitasking" to keep people connected to their faith throughout the week. Before his podcasts, he also uses his blog to connect with the 800 members of National Community Church.
Odeo (odeo.com), a podcast directory, plans to encourage more churches, synagogues and mosques to use them, said Adam Rugel, the Web site's director of content. Odeo lists a broad variety of religious podcasts, including programs from Buddhists, Muslims and Jews.
Despite the variety of religious podcasts, Christian programs make up by far the largest segment of the category. Shows range from recordings made at the kitchen table to slick broadcasts with pulsing music and crisp audio, like that of "RevTim" (www.godcast.org/categories/revtimPodcast/).
The Reverend Tim Hohm, a Protestant minister from El Sobrante, California, makes two 15-minute podcasts a week about family and work issues. He said an average of 6,000 people downloaded the program in the United States, Europe, Asia and Africa.
Mainstream religious broadcasting in the United States has long been dominated by conservative evangelicals like James Dobson and Al Mohler who have daily radio programs and claim audiences of millions. Both now offer some broadcasts as podcasts.
Melissa Rogers, a visiting professor of religion and public policy at the Divinity School at Wake Forest University, called podcasting a good illustration of the entrepreneurial drive behind Christian evangelicals. Nevertheless, Rogers does not expect podcasts to replace going to church.
"Podcasts provide a way for people who are very busy these days to get their religion on the fly, but for most people this will be a supplement, not a substitute," she said.
The Godcast Network (godcast.org), which began last October, offers 16 programs of Biblical readings, sermons and Christian rock.
"Rachel's Choice" is a weekly show by Rachel Patchett, the 8-year-old daughter of the network's founder, Craig Patchett, in which she plays a favorite Christian rock song followed by a reading from the Bible.
Most religious podcasts can be subscribed to with RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, a tool for condensing information into a feed. It enables automatic downloading of a new show to the listener's computer as soon it becomes available.
For podcasters who record prayers or psalms, the function is especially appealing because it offers their listeners easy access to daily devotional readings.
Batterson, for instance, is aiming in the next two years to attract 10,000 subscribers who are looking for doses of spirituality on demand.
One of the most popular Christian podcasts, Catholic Insider (catholicinsider.com), already has more than 10,000 listeners for each program.
The founder is the Reverend Roderick Vonhoegen, a priest from the Netherlands who heard about podcasting from one of his parishioners and has become an avid fan of Adam Curry, one of the founders of podcasting.
Vonhoegen began podcasting during a trip to Rome in February. When Pope John Paul II fell ill, he captured reactions in and around the Vatican.
Since then, Vonhoegen has done programs on the spiritual aspects of the "Star Wars" films and the Harry Potter books.
"Podcasting for us has been a resurrection of radio," Vonhoegen said. "It's the connection to a new generation."