Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Monday, February 6, 2012
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Facebook and Catholic Evangelism
Catholic News Agency by Andrew Haines:
I spend too much time on Facebook. I’m working to fix that. Recently, I’ve gotten a little help from an unexpected place.
About 90% of my Catholic “friends” on Facebook drive me up a wall. Up. A. Wall. The newsfeed wall of my Facebook account, to be more specific.
I’ve got 700-and-some connections on the site — a pretty conservative number, all things considered. But lately I’ve found that I can’t log onto Facebook without being bombarded by pious images of (pastel colored) saints, public requests (and offers) to remember certain intentions during the rosary, and comment after comment linking the word “hugs” with “prayer warrior.”
All three together is enough to force my cursor back to the URL bar for an emergency trip to another site. Anywhere.
At first, I thought maybe my selection (or acceptance, really) of Facebook friends tended toward the zealously devout. But I began to realize, more and more, that being Catholic in a 2.0 world has become almost indistinguishable from emotivism. Social media is new soil for building up the Church. But many Catholics — “traditional” and “progressive,” alike — are failing to grasp the true meaning of Pope Benedict’s call toevangelize the “digital continent.”
The maxim to “be in the world, not of it” seems especially apropos, here. New media and web-2.0 apps are, quite definitely, a product of the world. And Catholics should be conscious and prudent when it comes to appropriating into personal life elements that can, quite easily, become vehicles for some very unholy content. There’s a hesitancy about social media — Facebook, Twitter, and the like — that causes believers to wonder just how such tools can (or ever could) serve the greater glory of God.
On the other hand, the potential of the interactive universe is too much to pass up. Where once we were limited to effecting Christian conversion in the hearts of our physical neighbors, now we can reach out to those around the globe and from entirely different walks of life. Catholics, as historical proselytizers, naturally desire to seize on such an opportunity.
What is happening though, I fear, is that caution is overtaking the evangelical spirit. Rather than pervading the world of the digital continent, we’ve begun setting up camp within it. In essence, we’ve begun to create our own digital continent. Instead of establishing beachheads and outposts with an eye to leading others toward Rome, we’ve begun to transport the comforts of the City into an electronic wilderness.
In short, many Catholics view the internet as a suitable place to grow in faith and virtue. But that view couldn’t be more wrong, or more destructive.
When Julius Caesar famously ventured across the Alps to meet the Helvetii and Belgae tribes, he never aimed to make Gaul his home. As a proud son of Rome, he sought to conquer the northern lands and their peoples, winning them for the glory of the Republic. The ultimate goal though was to expand Roman power, not to recentralize it in a foreign land. Caesar knew the value of preserving the patria; and in 49 BC, he returned there to inhabit it — and to rule it — himself.
The same thing is true for Catholics in the digital continent: there is a great deal to be won for the sake of the patria (the heavenly one more than the earthly). But the primary goal is not to inhabit a foreign land forever, but to introduce those who live there to the beauty of civilization.
Moreover, just as no good commander sets up a permanent outpost on foreign soil — for fear of becoming weak and indefensible — Catholics shouldn’t become too comfortable on the digital continent. They should be excellent navigators and explorers; but not inhabitants. Social media and web-2.0-based interaction are wonderful tools for sparking dialogue and conversion. But they don’t substitute for the human-to-human interaction that lies at the foundation of evangelical kerygma. Total conversion requires an encounter with a total person (i.e., the total Christ), and Christ is not incarnate in a digital body.
That Catholics seek to ‘conquer’ new media for the sake of the kingdom is laudable. But the longer we continue to relax in our surroundings — to make social media and the internet our home — the more at risk we become of losing what it is that makes us Christians: namely, our full participation in the living, breathing, human Christ, who is only truly present in the Eucharist.
Evangelism in a foreign land is fruitful only insofar as we can make an authentic call to discipleship to those who claim it as their home. That’s the goal of our progress in the digital continent — and it is helpful to recall that from time to time.
* Andrew Haines is president of the Center for Morality in Public Life and a PhD student in Philosophy at The Catholic University of America. He lives in Virginia with his wife, Kathleen, and their son.
I spend too much time on Facebook. I’m working to fix that. Recently, I’ve gotten a little help from an unexpected place.
About 90% of my Catholic “friends” on Facebook drive me up a wall. Up. A. Wall. The newsfeed wall of my Facebook account, to be more specific.
I’ve got 700-and-some connections on the site — a pretty conservative number, all things considered. But lately I’ve found that I can’t log onto Facebook without being bombarded by pious images of (pastel colored) saints, public requests (and offers) to remember certain intentions during the rosary, and comment after comment linking the word “hugs” with “prayer warrior.”
All three together is enough to force my cursor back to the URL bar for an emergency trip to another site. Anywhere.
At first, I thought maybe my selection (or acceptance, really) of Facebook friends tended toward the zealously devout. But I began to realize, more and more, that being Catholic in a 2.0 world has become almost indistinguishable from emotivism. Social media is new soil for building up the Church. But many Catholics — “traditional” and “progressive,” alike — are failing to grasp the true meaning of Pope Benedict’s call toevangelize the “digital continent.”
The maxim to “be in the world, not of it” seems especially apropos, here. New media and web-2.0 apps are, quite definitely, a product of the world. And Catholics should be conscious and prudent when it comes to appropriating into personal life elements that can, quite easily, become vehicles for some very unholy content. There’s a hesitancy about social media — Facebook, Twitter, and the like — that causes believers to wonder just how such tools can (or ever could) serve the greater glory of God.
On the other hand, the potential of the interactive universe is too much to pass up. Where once we were limited to effecting Christian conversion in the hearts of our physical neighbors, now we can reach out to those around the globe and from entirely different walks of life. Catholics, as historical proselytizers, naturally desire to seize on such an opportunity.
What is happening though, I fear, is that caution is overtaking the evangelical spirit. Rather than pervading the world of the digital continent, we’ve begun setting up camp within it. In essence, we’ve begun to create our own digital continent. Instead of establishing beachheads and outposts with an eye to leading others toward Rome, we’ve begun to transport the comforts of the City into an electronic wilderness.
In short, many Catholics view the internet as a suitable place to grow in faith and virtue. But that view couldn’t be more wrong, or more destructive.
When Julius Caesar famously ventured across the Alps to meet the Helvetii and Belgae tribes, he never aimed to make Gaul his home. As a proud son of Rome, he sought to conquer the northern lands and their peoples, winning them for the glory of the Republic. The ultimate goal though was to expand Roman power, not to recentralize it in a foreign land. Caesar knew the value of preserving the patria; and in 49 BC, he returned there to inhabit it — and to rule it — himself.
The same thing is true for Catholics in the digital continent: there is a great deal to be won for the sake of the patria (the heavenly one more than the earthly). But the primary goal is not to inhabit a foreign land forever, but to introduce those who live there to the beauty of civilization.
Moreover, just as no good commander sets up a permanent outpost on foreign soil — for fear of becoming weak and indefensible — Catholics shouldn’t become too comfortable on the digital continent. They should be excellent navigators and explorers; but not inhabitants. Social media and web-2.0-based interaction are wonderful tools for sparking dialogue and conversion. But they don’t substitute for the human-to-human interaction that lies at the foundation of evangelical kerygma. Total conversion requires an encounter with a total person (i.e., the total Christ), and Christ is not incarnate in a digital body.
That Catholics seek to ‘conquer’ new media for the sake of the kingdom is laudable. But the longer we continue to relax in our surroundings — to make social media and the internet our home — the more at risk we become of losing what it is that makes us Christians: namely, our full participation in the living, breathing, human Christ, who is only truly present in the Eucharist.
Evangelism in a foreign land is fruitful only insofar as we can make an authentic call to discipleship to those who claim it as their home. That’s the goal of our progress in the digital continent — and it is helpful to recall that from time to time.
* Andrew Haines is president of the Center for Morality in Public Life and a PhD student in Philosophy at The Catholic University of America. He lives in Virginia with his wife, Kathleen, and their son.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Christian Facebook pages lead Lady Gaga and others' pages
Catholic News Agency:
Religious pages on Facebook attract significant engagement and pages about Jesus and the Bible recently beat out pop stars like Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga in attracting user activity.
The “Jesus Daily” page led user activity rankings, with nearly 2.3 million interactions in the week of May 9 to May 15, the social media analysis site AllFacebook.com reported. The page broadcasts daily devotional material, including the words of Jesus from the Bible.
Over 900,000 interactions took place on the page for “The Bible,” which was second-highest in the rankings. It too shares daily Bible quotations.
The Spanish-language page “Dios Es Bueno!” ranked ninth in user interactions, with nearly 460,000 in the week monitored by AllFacebook.com.
A page titled “Jesus Christ” came in 16th with almost 316,000 interactions, ahead of the NBA.
Other high ranking pages included sports teams, pop culture stars, and prominent figures from around the world.
Facebook pages can be created by individuals or organizations to spread information to followers. According to Facebook statistics, there are over 900 million interactions with pages, groups, events and community pages on the site each month.
Religious pages on Facebook attract significant engagement and pages about Jesus and the Bible recently beat out pop stars like Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga in attracting user activity.
The “Jesus Daily” page led user activity rankings, with nearly 2.3 million interactions in the week of May 9 to May 15, the social media analysis site AllFacebook.com reported. The page broadcasts daily devotional material, including the words of Jesus from the Bible.
Over 900,000 interactions took place on the page for “The Bible,” which was second-highest in the rankings. It too shares daily Bible quotations.
The Spanish-language page “Dios Es Bueno!” ranked ninth in user interactions, with nearly 460,000 in the week monitored by AllFacebook.com.
A page titled “Jesus Christ” came in 16th with almost 316,000 interactions, ahead of the NBA.
Other high ranking pages included sports teams, pop culture stars, and prominent figures from around the world.
Facebook pages can be created by individuals or organizations to spread information to followers. According to Facebook statistics, there are over 900 million interactions with pages, groups, events and community pages on the site each month.
Friday, April 8, 2011
6 Rules for Facebook
The day my mother joined Facebook, I updated my status to read: "That loud crashing sound you just heard? That was worlds . . . colliding."
Imagine the noise, then, when my 16-year-old daughter created her page last month. Kateri is a responsible young lady, and yet still I felt the need to set some ground rules before allowing her the privilege of social networking.
It's not just teenagers who need Facebook rules. We all do. Here are some of mine.
1. Less is more.
This is tricky, because I love to know other people's details. I think it's encouraging (and a little bit hilarious) when a friend confides to Facebook that she was mortified to hear her toddler shout out a curse word when he spilled a cup of juice at his grandmother's house.
Once upon a time, though, people used to be demure. That was a good thing. I don't need to know that the nice lady who sits near me at Mass is at Peak Day + 3 and her husband is making her crazy, and I don't need to know the number of bowel movements my kids' swimming teacher's cat has had this morning. If you are wondering whether any particular bit of information is "over-sharing," it probably is. We could all use a dose of good old-fashioned mystery.
2. Check your settings.
Once upon a time, though, people used to be demure. That was a good thing. I don't need to know that the nice lady who sits near me at Mass is at Peak Day + 3 and her husband is making her crazy, and I don't need to know the number of bowel movements my kids' swimming teacher's cat has had this morning. If you are wondering whether any particular bit of information is "over-sharing," it probably is. We could all use a dose of good old-fashioned mystery.
2. Check your settings.
This is pretty basic, but the number of people who have no idea what the privacy settings are on their Facebook pages astonishes me. Even if you think you know what your settings are, make it a habit to check them frequently. One thing Facebook excels at is changing the rules when no one's looking. You might have missed the memo that now sets "Everyone Sees Everything, Even that Karaoke Moment from Your Nephew's Graduation Party" as the default.
3. Remember: It's forever.
3. Remember: It's forever.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Youths facing 'Facebook Depression'
From The Christian Post 
Youths who spend a lot of time on social media sites are at risk of "Facebook depression," a group of doctors say.
Though the symptoms and the resulting harmful behavior may be similar to "offline depression," the American Academy of Pediatrics has proposed Facebook depression as a new phenomenon.
The AAP issued a new clinical report, “The Impact of Social Media Use on Children, Adolescents and Families,” published online on Monday, detailing both the negative and positive effects of social media use on youth and families.
The report points out that the number of preadolescents and adolescents using such sites as Facebook and MySpace has increased dramatically during the last five years.
Facebook currently has more than 500 million active users. According to ComScore, a firm that measures Internet traffic, the share of visitors to Facebook under 18 years of age increased over the past year to 11.1 percent.
A 2009 Common Sense Media poll revealed that 22 percent of teenagers log on to their favorite social media site more than 10 times a day.
Gwenn O’Keeffe, MD, FAAP, co-author of the clinical report, says social media, rather than face-to-face interaction, is the primary way some teens and tweens interact socially.
“A large part of this generation’s social and emotional development is occurring while on the Internet and on cell phones," she stated in the report.
"Facebook is where all the teens are hanging out now. It's their corner store," O'Keeffe illustrated, according to The Associated Press.
While the benefits of social media participation include staying connected with friends and family, making new friends, community engagement, and enhancement of creativity, the AAP report cautions that using the online sites becomes a risk to youths more often than most adults realize.
Among the potential harms are cyberbullying, social anxiety, severe isolation, and now what doctors are identifying as Facebook depression.
"Acceptance by and contact with peers is an important element of adolescent life. The intensity of the online world is thought to be a factor that may trigger depression in some adolescents," the report points out.
The pressure to feel accepted isn't just felt among teens either. Interestingly, research by Telstra released last month found that 18- to 30-year-olds use Facebook in ways to help them appear cooler.
Twenty-two percent said they use the Facebook Places "check-in" feature to look cool, 10 percent use the feature to fit in with all the cool people who are doing it, and 10 percent use it to make others jealous.
One-third of the respondents admitted to feeling jealous or left out when they see their friends check-in on Facebook Places.
Facebook offers other unique features that could make it particularly tough for kids trying to fit in.
According to O'Keeffe, the number of Facebook friends, status updates and photos of happy people are some of the factors that could contribute to depression.
It can be more painful than sitting alone in a school cafeteria, O’Keeffe said, as reported by AP.
For Rhett Smith, a therapist and part-time pastor to youth and families, the latest AAP report confirms what he and many others have been feeling.
"One of the glaring paradoxes in my use of technology/social media, is that it has both the ability to make me feel connected and intimate with others, while at the same time feeling isolated, alienated and lonely," he said in an earlier blog post.
"Has all the technology relationally disconnected us in a sense, replacing the processes (befriending, getting to know each other, sharing life, etc.), where instead we just value the end results (number of followers, blog traffic, etc.)?"
The AAP warns that youths who do suffer from Facebook depression could turn to risky Internet sites for help – sites that promote substance abuse, unsafe sexual practices, or aggressive or self-destructive behaviors.
"Parents need to understand these technologies so they can relate to their children’s online world – and comfortably parent in that world," O'Keeffe advised.
Moreover, parents need to recognize the reality of an increasingly digital world that their children are growing up in.
"Look at childhood as it is today. Help really see them as today's kids, not try to force them into a mold of yesterday's kids," she added.
Youths who spend a lot of time on social media sites are at risk of "Facebook depression," a group of doctors say.
Though the symptoms and the resulting harmful behavior may be similar to "offline depression," the American Academy of Pediatrics has proposed Facebook depression as a new phenomenon.
The AAP issued a new clinical report, “The Impact of Social Media Use on Children, Adolescents and Families,” published online on Monday, detailing both the negative and positive effects of social media use on youth and families.
The report points out that the number of preadolescents and adolescents using such sites as Facebook and MySpace has increased dramatically during the last five years.
Facebook currently has more than 500 million active users. According to ComScore, a firm that measures Internet traffic, the share of visitors to Facebook under 18 years of age increased over the past year to 11.1 percent.
A 2009 Common Sense Media poll revealed that 22 percent of teenagers log on to their favorite social media site more than 10 times a day.
Gwenn O’Keeffe, MD, FAAP, co-author of the clinical report, says social media, rather than face-to-face interaction, is the primary way some teens and tweens interact socially.
“A large part of this generation’s social and emotional development is occurring while on the Internet and on cell phones," she stated in the report.
"Facebook is where all the teens are hanging out now. It's their corner store," O'Keeffe illustrated, according to The Associated Press.
While the benefits of social media participation include staying connected with friends and family, making new friends, community engagement, and enhancement of creativity, the AAP report cautions that using the online sites becomes a risk to youths more often than most adults realize.
Among the potential harms are cyberbullying, social anxiety, severe isolation, and now what doctors are identifying as Facebook depression.
"Acceptance by and contact with peers is an important element of adolescent life. The intensity of the online world is thought to be a factor that may trigger depression in some adolescents," the report points out.
The pressure to feel accepted isn't just felt among teens either. Interestingly, research by Telstra released last month found that 18- to 30-year-olds use Facebook in ways to help them appear cooler.
Twenty-two percent said they use the Facebook Places "check-in" feature to look cool, 10 percent use the feature to fit in with all the cool people who are doing it, and 10 percent use it to make others jealous.
One-third of the respondents admitted to feeling jealous or left out when they see their friends check-in on Facebook Places.
Facebook offers other unique features that could make it particularly tough for kids trying to fit in.
According to O'Keeffe, the number of Facebook friends, status updates and photos of happy people are some of the factors that could contribute to depression.
It can be more painful than sitting alone in a school cafeteria, O’Keeffe said, as reported by AP.
For Rhett Smith, a therapist and part-time pastor to youth and families, the latest AAP report confirms what he and many others have been feeling.
"One of the glaring paradoxes in my use of technology/social media, is that it has both the ability to make me feel connected and intimate with others, while at the same time feeling isolated, alienated and lonely," he said in an earlier blog post.
"Has all the technology relationally disconnected us in a sense, replacing the processes (befriending, getting to know each other, sharing life, etc.), where instead we just value the end results (number of followers, blog traffic, etc.)?"
The AAP warns that youths who do suffer from Facebook depression could turn to risky Internet sites for help – sites that promote substance abuse, unsafe sexual practices, or aggressive or self-destructive behaviors.
"Parents need to understand these technologies so they can relate to their children’s online world – and comfortably parent in that world," O'Keeffe advised.
Moreover, parents need to recognize the reality of an increasingly digital world that their children are growing up in.
"Look at childhood as it is today. Help really see them as today's kids, not try to force them into a mold of yesterday's kids," she added.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Narcissism on Facebook
I thought that this article was timely in light of Father Ron Knott's talk about Narcissism at the Parish Mission on Tuesday night.
Who uses Facebook? The simple answer is a whole lot of people: The online social network has more than 600 million members.
But what sets them apart from those who use the Internet but have chosen not to play in Mark Zuckerberg’s virtual playground? New research from Australia provides someless than flattering answers.
“Facebook users tend to be more extroverted and narcissistic, but less conscientious and socially lonely, than non-users,” Tracii Ryan and Sophia Xenosof RMIT University in Melbourne write in the journal Computers in Human Behavior.
Instead of falling in love with his own image in a pond, today’s narcissist apparently gazes adoringly at his own Facebook profile.
Seeing a gap in the literature (most previous surveys of Facebook users have been limited to university students), Ryan and Xenos decided to survey a wider range of Internet users in Australia (where, they report, nearly half the population consists of active Facebook users). Their sample consisted of 1,324 participants, all between the ages of 18 and 44. All but 166 of them were Facebook users.
The participants completed a 124-question online survey, which measured such things as their “big five” personality traits (extr0version, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and openness to experience), narcissistic tendencies, shyness, loneliness, and the specifics of their Facebook usage.
Among Facebook users, the amount of time spent on the site per day varied widely. Seventeen percent of users reported they spent 10 minutes or less, 24 percent between 10 and 30 minutes, 23 percent between 31 and 60 minutes, 17 percent between one and two hours, and 19 percent two hours or more.
“There was a significant positive correlation between time spent on Facebook per day and two of the personality variables: neuroticism and total loneliness,” the researchers report.
“The most preferred Facebook features were photos, messages, the wall and status updates. Games, notes and events were least preferred. Both the wall and messages appear to be the preferred means of communication on Facebook.”
Ryan and Xenos report Facebook appeals to a wide variety of people, and it “gratifies its users in different ways depending on their individual
characteristics.” That said, their descriptions of the personality types that gravitate to the site are a bit disturbing.
“Firstly, Facebook users have higher levels of total narcissism, exhibitionism and leadership than Facebook non-users,” they write. “Secondly, individuals with higher scores on exhibitionism also have higher preferences for photos and status updates (than the site’s other features).”
These findings “substantiate the proposition that Facebook is particularly appealing for narcissistic and exhibitionistic people,” they conclude. “In fact, it could be argued that Facebook specifically gratifies the narcissistic individual’s need to engage in self-promoting and superficial behavior.”
“One of the most noteworthy findings was the tendency for neurotic and lonely individuals to spend greater amounts of time on Facebook per day than non-lonely individuals,” they add. “For lonely people in particular, it appears they are mainly using Facebook to partake in passive activities, instead of providing active social contributions.”
It’s worth repeating that these findings are exclusively from Australia, and thus not necessarily representative of Facebook’s worldwide membership. And the number of nonusers in the study was relatively small. So this study cannot be called definitive.
Nevertheless, its findings suggest narcissists use Facebook to inflate their already puffed-up egos, while lonely people passively navigate it, observing the life that is passing them by. Perhaps both groups would be better off watching a good movie — say, The Social Network.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Giving up Facebook for Lent
from Catholic Womanhood by Cheryl Dickow Catholic wife, mother, author and speaker.
For several years I gave up chocolate for Lent. Like my many parochial middle school students, the idea of going without chocolate candy for 40 days seemed like a fairly good way to “suffer” as I was called to contemplate Jesus’ suffering. It seemed to be a perfect way to give up something that I could sincerely offer up during my prayers and as I spent time in reflection.
For several years I gave up chocolate for Lent. Like my many parochial middle school students, the idea of going without chocolate candy for 40 days seemed like a fairly good way to “suffer” as I was called to contemplate Jesus’ suffering. It seemed to be a perfect way to give up something that I could sincerely offer up during my prayers and as I spent time in reflection.
That was until our pastor cautioned us about choosing to give up something we knew we ought to give up because it would “benefit” us; when, instead, what we should be doing is giving up something that would not be a “benefit” to us. Gee, I remember thinking, chocolate really has fallen into the “this is good for me to give up category” because I began to consider the “benefits” of losing a couple of pounds and being a bit healthier for the effort.
Now what? I wondered.
In the middle of all this I also tried some things from the It-isn’t-about-giving-up-as-much-as-it-is about-making-changes category. That included the year where I committed to daily Rosary and the year that I wanted to make sure I said “one good and positive thing” each day to my family members.
None of these Lenten experiences stand out as ways that made the value of sacrifice something that is real, tangible and personal.
So each year, as Lent approaches, I seek to know more deeply what it is that I should be doing, or not doing, for Lent—for God. This year was no different. Ash Wednesday loomed on the calendar and I began asking, “what will it be this year, Lord? Let me know, please, and I will obey.”
At this point let me interject that I have been attending an Ignatian Spiritual Retreat which meets a couple of times a month and the fruit—the graces—from the exercises has been abundant, to say the least.
So off to a dinner party I go, with Ash Wednesday less than a week away, and my request to know what Lent sacrifice the Lord has in store for me being freshly made and asked of Him. I shouldn’t be surprised, then, that the first conversation I have upon entering our guest’s home is with a woman I greatly admire—a Facebook friend and a real-life friend—who says that she is giving up Facebook for Lent!
My heart immediately responds with recognition that THIS is my answer.
Facebook, unlike chocolate, won’t be good for me to give up; it won’t benefit me one bit.
Frankly, just the opposite is true—it may be detrimental to my business of publishing books and sharing news of author happenings and various events.
Indeed, this true sacrifice is made known to me in the last days of the contest in which one of our titles—Stories for the Homeschool Heart—is in the running for “Best Catholic Book of 2010!” If it wins, not being on Facebook and LinkedIn and writing articles means I can’t take advantage of the social network to use this win in a very significant promotional way. A win would be something that just begs for tons of Internet attention and fanfare.
And the good Lord is asking me to walk away.
That, I say to myself, is the ultimate sacrifice!
You see, I’ve easily worked 60 and 70 hour weeks for the past four or five years and am now seeing that it is paying off. But in the recesses of my heart, I know I am being called to leave the Internet Super Highway behind during Lent and spend that time with God—in reading His word, in Adoration, in Mass, in the Gospels by way of the Rosary. I have previously tried to tell myself that being a witness meant embracing this new social media and that I was doing His will; but I was only giving myself an excuse to stay connected to the Internet.
So with this contest, it became crystal clear to me what my sacrifice was to be this Lent; and I also know that is isn’t just about me removing myself from Facebook. I won’t be writing articles during Lent either; I’m removing myself from some key Internet activities so that my time with God becomes more abundant, and definitely more personal.
God is calling me and I can’t ignore Him.
What will this mean for Bezalel Books?
I have no idea; but I’m not worried. It all belongs to God anyhow.
Each of us can be replaced in a heartbeat on the Internet—no matter how popular and followed we may appear—but each of us is completely irreplaceable to God so that’s where I want to spend my Lenten time: In His care, in His arms, in His presence, in His word.
Now what? I wondered.
In the middle of all this I also tried some things from the It-isn’t-about-giving-up-as-much-as-it-is about-making-changes category. That included the year where I committed to daily Rosary and the year that I wanted to make sure I said “one good and positive thing” each day to my family members.
None of these Lenten experiences stand out as ways that made the value of sacrifice something that is real, tangible and personal.
So each year, as Lent approaches, I seek to know more deeply what it is that I should be doing, or not doing, for Lent—for God. This year was no different. Ash Wednesday loomed on the calendar and I began asking, “what will it be this year, Lord? Let me know, please, and I will obey.”
At this point let me interject that I have been attending an Ignatian Spiritual Retreat which meets a couple of times a month and the fruit—the graces—from the exercises has been abundant, to say the least.
So off to a dinner party I go, with Ash Wednesday less than a week away, and my request to know what Lent sacrifice the Lord has in store for me being freshly made and asked of Him. I shouldn’t be surprised, then, that the first conversation I have upon entering our guest’s home is with a woman I greatly admire—a Facebook friend and a real-life friend—who says that she is giving up Facebook for Lent!
My heart immediately responds with recognition that THIS is my answer.
Facebook, unlike chocolate, won’t be good for me to give up; it won’t benefit me one bit.
Frankly, just the opposite is true—it may be detrimental to my business of publishing books and sharing news of author happenings and various events.
Indeed, this true sacrifice is made known to me in the last days of the contest in which one of our titles—Stories for the Homeschool Heart—is in the running for “Best Catholic Book of 2010!” If it wins, not being on Facebook and LinkedIn and writing articles means I can’t take advantage of the social network to use this win in a very significant promotional way. A win would be something that just begs for tons of Internet attention and fanfare.
And the good Lord is asking me to walk away.
That, I say to myself, is the ultimate sacrifice!
You see, I’ve easily worked 60 and 70 hour weeks for the past four or five years and am now seeing that it is paying off. But in the recesses of my heart, I know I am being called to leave the Internet Super Highway behind during Lent and spend that time with God—in reading His word, in Adoration, in Mass, in the Gospels by way of the Rosary. I have previously tried to tell myself that being a witness meant embracing this new social media and that I was doing His will; but I was only giving myself an excuse to stay connected to the Internet.
So with this contest, it became crystal clear to me what my sacrifice was to be this Lent; and I also know that is isn’t just about me removing myself from Facebook. I won’t be writing articles during Lent either; I’m removing myself from some key Internet activities so that my time with God becomes more abundant, and definitely more personal.
God is calling me and I can’t ignore Him.
What will this mean for Bezalel Books?
I have no idea; but I’m not worried. It all belongs to God anyhow.
Each of us can be replaced in a heartbeat on the Internet—no matter how popular and followed we may appear—but each of us is completely irreplaceable to God so that’s where I want to spend my Lenten time: In His care, in His arms, in His presence, in His word.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
A popular fast for Lent...give up Facebook
For Christians, Ash Wednesday starts a period of reflection and of sacrifice, usually involving a fast of some sort between now and Easter. And the decision about what to give up for lent has taken a 21st century twist.
Giving up social media Facebook, Twitter, and the like, has emerged as one of the more popular fasts for Lent.
It's something that's quickly become ingrained in our lives, and available in the palms of our hands.
Ann O'Connell gave up Facebook for Lent last year. "When I tried to think about something that I truly overindulged in all the time, the only thing that really came to mind was Facebook. I spent an awful lot of time on there."
Lent lasts 40 days and ends on Easter Sunday
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