new media

This article gives us reason for pause:

What do college students in China, Chile, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Uganda have in common? According to a new global study by the University of Maryland's International Center for Media & the Public Affairs (ICMPA) and the Salzburg Academy on Media & Global Change, they're all addicted to media. That might not seem like news—after all, there's a reason the term "CrackBerry" came into being—but just how severely students are addicted is startling, and has real implications for our schools where Skyping, blogging, learning-via-gaming technology is increasingly the norm.

How do we engage an audience that is quite immersed in the world of technology, social media, etc., and bring them into a real, physical and emotional relationship with other humans, and even more importantly, the real and life-giving presence of Jesus Christ?

Just as in all things in our current state of being, we should be "in the world, but not of it."

Another side note: If college students are so addicted to media, I can guarantee that many, if not most, have had a large amount of exposure to pornography. This bodes ill for our cultural values in the coming years.

[Note: Please read through the comments at the end of this post for some great insights about this situation.]

Time and time again, I'm seeing media reports that portray something that happens in the Church with either incorrect, or easily-misconstrued wording, and it continually paints the Church in a strange—if not bad—light.

The latest example: a new app called 'Confession' on the iPhone App Store.

From BBC's article on the app:

It also allows them to examine their conscience based on personalised factors such as age, sex and marital status - but it is not intended to replace traditional confession entirely.

Instead, it encourages users to understand their actions and then visit their priest for absolution.

It would be nice if we could be a little more clear in this wording—this app in no way whatsoever replaces any part of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. It is merely a tool/checklist to help penitents with their Examination of Conscience.

Since the article also points out that the Catholic Church has given its Imprimatur to this app, this surely means Catholics no longer need to visit the confessional to be absolved, correct? Nope. But that's the inference that will be drawn by almost every non-Catholic who knows anything about the Sacrament, and likely most Catholics as well (who goes to Reconciliation anymore, anyways? Isn't it some optional practice? </sarcasm>).

For example, from Geekologie: Catholic Church Approves Confession App

$1.99 to have your sins forgiven, not a bad deal! That's right folks, the Catholic Church has officially approved an iPhone app that guides worshipers through the process of confession. 

I've been monitoring many different aspects of the Church's communications over the past few years, and, as most of the readers of this post already know, it is easy to find many more examples of positive Catholic news gone awry—mostly because it was not communicated clearly, cohesively, immediately, and accessibly, to the media and to the public.

It is my goal (and I hope it is yours as well) to help make this happen less frequently.

[Update:] It was pointed out that an anchor on CNN's Newsroom also said of the app:

PHILLIPS: I'm a woman of the cloth, OK? All right. Here's the deal. For $1.99 you can now get this app, all right? And it's for sinners. And I'm not -- and the Catholic Church is actually saying -- endorsing this. So you don't have to go to church. You don't have to go see the priest. All you do is you go on to this app, OK, you log in.

(Source). [Emphasis mine]

I long for the day when I and others can spend more time communicating the truth, and new messages of hope and love, rather than clarifying that which others have said/introduced about the faith.

From Matthew Warner's blog on the National Catholic Register website: How are parishes using new media?

Last week I asked my Twitter followers for some examples of parishes using new media. I got some good ones, which I was pleased with. So thank you fellow tweeters!

But I must admit that, overall, I was a bit disappointed in my search. I also “googled” the topic fairly extensively and the pickin’s were few. I hope that one day when we google “Catholic Parish,” we are blown away with how impressed we are with the many, many great results we find. In the meantime, we have some learning, sharing and working to do! Keep in mind I am looking for new media being applied specifically to the life of the parish, not simply its use in various other ministries by those in the Church.

I tried to capture a good variety of new media applications that parishes might find useful. But I hope it doesn’t stop there. I hope leaders of parishes will be contacting these parishes, asking them what works and what doesn’t and all taking some steps forward together. I also pray that the laity who have been blessed with the ability to produce and apply new media will come forward and fulfill an important roll in their Church.

What do you think? Be sure to drop Matthew a line either over on the original post (which has more findings from Matthew), or on Twitter (@MatthewWarner). (Matthew also blogs at Fallible Blogma, and is the founder of TweetCatholic).

It looks like @iJimCoyle is tweeting from the Catholic Media Conference in Louisiana this week. Found today on his Twitter stream:

New Media & New Evangelization: 5 Ways to Make a Difference (from Sr Rose Pacatte FSP)

1. Become mindful media consumers by watching (doing) media together and talking about what you experience.
2. Use (mainstream) media in your teaching.
3. Become a media producer & encourage students & people w/ whom you share faith to "make media."
4. Make media the subject of evangelization, preaching, and catechesis.
5. Become proactive advocate for media productions that reflect Catholic social teaching because these are human, humane, & Gospel themes.

Sounds great... but where is the significance for 'new media?' At a time when our news media is bleeding like never before, hurting for money and looking to find a solid path for working online in the midst of the traditional web, Twitter, FourSquare, Facebook, etc., we need to be more specific in our goals for new media use in the Church, especially by Catholic publications.

Of course, reading from a live Twitter feed of a participant might not be the best way to participate in this Catholic Media Convention, but there isn't any other way to do it, and the Convention Blog doesn't even seem to have any content... It would be nice to have at least an official Twitter feed :)

At least they have a Facebook page...

I hear from many people involved in Diocesan and organizational work that they are interested in "doing more things online" and "connecting with their members online." it's great to wish for these things, and even better to try to achieve them. But wouldn't it be nice to actually achieve these goals?

It's not the hardest thing to do. And it's not like technology is standing in the way and is extrememly hard to use... But time and time again, I see things done that hinder the Church's ability to truly communicate and connect with it's members online in the best way possible. One such incidence was the start of a new "blog" by Archbishop Timothy Dolan on the Archdiocese of New York's website.

The reason I put "blog" in parentheses is that this so-called blog could be compared to an eight cylinder engine firing on only four pistons; there are many things missing:

• There in no RSS or Atom feed to allow people to subscribe and receive automated updates of new blog posts (though there is a feed for each posts' comments... but seriously, which is more important???).
  • As an aside, once you have a feed, you also need to make sure you integrate it properly so there's not only an easily visible link or button for it on the web page, but it's also appearing in the site's meta tags so people using modern web browsers can subscribe easily in the standard way.
• In the absence of a feed, there is no email list or any other method with which the diocese could "push" updates to the faithful.
• The main page of the blog doesn't even show the content!
• There's no way to promote, rate, or otherwise interact with the content - not even a "post to Twitter" link (though there are comments, so that's a plus).

One positive aspect is that the 'blog' is incorporated into the rest of the Archdiocese of New York's website, so all the Google link power of the archny.org domain exists within the blog posts, something that doesn't happen for many groups who choose to host their blogs elsewhere (the highest profile blog I know of like this is the USCCB Media Blog, hosted on Blogger). Another positive aspect is the fact that the blog pages are well-formatted in terms of their html - using H2, <p>, etc. correctly :-) Continue Reading »

Seen recently in The Catholic Spirit, a publication from the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis:

"To their parishioners, they are known simply as “Father Jay” and “Father Bill.” But to many others, Father Jay Finelli and Father Bill Kessler are “iPadre” and the “Tech­nopriest.”

The two diocesan priests are among a growing number of Catholic clergy using podcasting and other new media to spread the message of the church...

...Father Kessler believes that podcasting and other new media technology can serve as a powerful tool for evangelization. Because of new media, “folks who otherwise wouldn’t hear the Gospel will maybe hear the Gospel; folks who don’t step into our churches at all may hear something that affects them,” he said. [Continue Reading: Priests Find Great Potential in Use of New Media – The Catholic Spirit].

Do you know of any clergy taking on the social web with such panache, and using social means to supplement their other evangelical tools? (Besides Fr. Vonhögen, of course—he has a monopoly on the field with SQPN ;-).

Seen in St. Louis: The Office of Youth Ministry is live-blogging the 2009 Steubenville St. Louis Mid-America Youth Conference! Pretty snazzy - pictures, videos, audio clips, etc., and viewers can rate their favorite content!

Check it out, and leave feedback for @archstl on Twitter, or in the comments here. Have you live-blogged an event before? Are there any other events that are being (or have been) live-blogged by a Catholic group? It's definitely a way to increase visibility and 'branding.'