Pope Goes Web 2.0, but Warns Flock of the Dangers of Too Much Facebooking
One of the world’s oldest and most widely recognized organized religions leaped into the deep end of the Web 2.0 pool last week, as Pope Benedict XVI unveiled his own YouTube channel. The channel will broadcast the Pope’s speeches and feature news coverage of the pontiff’s activities, and what’s more, the Vatican’s TV and radio outfits will coordinate with Google on the Pope’s new YouTube initiative.
The move marks the latest foray by the Catholic church into the digisphere. The late Pope John Paul II became the first pope to send an email, and he oversaw the creation of the Vatican’s first website in 1995. Since then, things have been going gangbusters. In December 2008, the Vatican formally endorsed an Apple iPhone app called iBreviary, which allows users to load the Breviary prayer book—used for saying all sorts of prayers, including a Catholic mass—onto their iPhones. Pope Benedict XVI also has his own Facebook fan page, which, as of last week, has 24,600 fans.
Ironically, in a message to open the 43rd World Day of Communications, Pope Benedict XVI cautioned against Facebook addiction. According to the pontiff, while “the concept of friendship has enjoyed a renewed prominence in the vocabulary of the new digital social networks that have emerged in the last few years,” we should be “careful, therefore, never to trivialize the concept or the experience of friendship. It would be sad if our desire to sustain and develop online friendships were to be at the cost of our availability to engage with our families, or neighbors, ad those we meet in the daily reality of our places of work, education, and recreation. If the desire for virtual connectedness becomes obsessive, it may in fact function to isolate individuals from real social interaction while also disrupting the patterns of rest, silence, and reflection that are necessary for healthy human development.”
So while the pope might have a Facebook presence, don’t expect him to play along if you tag him in a 25 Random Things exercise.
While the pope might be a late Catholic entry into the Web 2.0 space, the Jesuits have been doing it for years. Way back in July 2007, Jesuit priest and academic Father Antonio Spadaro encouraged fellow Catholics not to be afraid of entering the virtual world to find converts wishing to better themselves. “Deep down, the digital world can be considered, in its way, mission territory,” said Spadaro.
By Robert Pothier