A great opportunity

The National Days on the Media held a few days ago in Fatima to the presence of several dozens of participants, focused on the “Digital Gospel”. In delivering the event’s closing remarks, Msgr. Manuel Clemente, President of the Episcopal Commission for Culture, Cultural Goods and the Media, pointed to the “plurality of the Catholic presence on the Internet”, that ought to be viewed as “a virtuousness that must be further enhanced and developed, while at the same time promoting access and project diversification rather than uniformity”. Without neglecting “the need for real and true coexistence”, the bishop of Oporto admitted that “virtual media spurs the development of transmission and communication, thus the evangelical message can be heard also by those who don’t regularly attend our Eucharistic assemblies”.Overcoming mistrust. “In the present atmosphere marked by widespread cultural mistrust towards the traditional communities and institutions, the media enables the Christian message to be heard also by those who are least familiar to our experiences”, the prelate remarked. The bishop of Coimbra, Msgr. Albino Cleto, urged “the faithful to transform the official positions of bishops, at times marked by delays and excessive theoretic expressions, into the language of the man on the street. All Catholics should be committed and take advantage of these tools to show the face of the Church in public, also without waiting for the official stands of Church hierarchy to be pronounced”. Father Manuel Morujão, newly-appointed Secretary of Portugal’s Bishops Conference (Cep), pointed out that “often, the Church forgets to inform the faithful about her websites”, this includes the almost total lack of Internet reference in national homilies. Concrete presence. During the meeting a workshop was held on the presence of the Portuguese Church on the Internet, with concrete examples in different sectors. Jesuit father Filipe Martins recalled the project “Essejota.net”, that seeks to reach out to people “who are the margins of the Church”, by means of “open proposals” which range from poetry to photography, from music to movies, along with spiritual reflections. Luís Gonzaga, founder of the portal “paroquias.org”, reported on this initiative for lay people that aims at “evangelizing, availing itself of new technologies and new media channels”, with special sections devoted to spirituality, information and debates on the current problems pertaining to Catholic life. Father Marcelino Ferreira, illustrated the inter-parish project “Paroquiasdebraga.org” and highlighted the potentials of the Internet such as “promoting communion and community, meeting, informing, dialoguing, and spreading the evangelical message”. Samuel Mendonça, responsible of the portal of the diocese of Algarve (Diocese-algarve.pt) spoke about “an enlargement initiative” in the south of the country that will be called Ridisc – Informational network for dioceses and socio-cultural institutions (Ridisc.org.), that aims at supplying IT tools throughout the region, including a diocesan portal and management plan, and a parish management plan. Speaking over the Internet. A round table was centered on “The religious and the Internet”. Octávio Carmo, from the Portuguese Catholic Agency Ecclesia, referred that “there should be no hesitation in presenting religious themes on line, thus using the language that is most appropriate to this communication tool”. “Portugal has various religious websites that can be considered among the best in Catholic- majority Countries”, he acknowledged. The journalist did however focus on the “need to overcome an old-dated fatalistic approach, marked by prejudices and complaints, to the benefit of a simpler, more concrete and direct language that can be fully understood by the faithful as by non-Catholics”. Pedro Leal, from Rádio Renascença, mentioned a “ongoing revolution”, whereby “we ought to prevent excessive offers that might hinder the identification of the best proposal”. He highlighted the diversification of programs offered by the online radio, and added that it is necessary to provide “an increasing number of proposals in the same web space”. Finally, José Antonio dos Santos, from Lusa Agency, acknowledged the “remarkably positive contribution made by the Catholic presence in the virtual world”, since, he added, “the Portuguese Church has established a significant presence on the web”.