Trolls

church gargoyles

Thank you for asking.

This would be a great side-topic for a pastoral convention,

perhaps developing 'best practices

for handling people who are slow to present themselves, like Zacchaeus.

For hardcore trolls, I would have my ways, that some might find ...severe,

including blocking.

But, if I were a pastor with a church,

I would give a person making an email contact,

an overstatement saying

that my ultimate goal is to connect with them in-person,

and that my task list is too great for endless rabbit-trail email exchanges

without the transparency and the pleasure of in-person meetings.

If they were not local, I would eventually require their city and state info,

to transfer their inquiries to someone that can meet them in person.

If they refused, communication would cease.

If they are local, I would give them reading assignments

and the next communication would depend on them first completing the reading assignment.

At some point I would require a personal meeting, or the emails would need to end.

Blocking would be the last resort.