BISHOPS are never too old for high technology.
Thus, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) announced Wednesday that it has directed every Filipino bishop to create their own blog to expand their reach to the faithful.
As defined, a blog a Web site that contains dated entries in reverse chronological order (most recent first) about a particular topic. Functioning as an online journal, blogs can be written by one person or a group of contributors. Entries contain commentary and links to other Web sites, and images as well as a search facility may also be included.
Mark Inigo Tallara, information officer and media relation assistant of the CBCP, said "our aim is to make every bishop accessible to the faithful, particularly to the youth that’s why we want each of them to have their own blog."
Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz, who is one of the first bishops to have his blog on the Internet, said he has his own blog not just because he is following the call of the late Pope John Paul II to tap the Internet as its new form of evangelization but to also forward the truth in dated "socio-moral issues".
Aside from Cruz, other prelates that already have their blog include outgoing CBCP president and Davao Archbishop Fernando Capalla, Cotabato Archbishop Orlando Queveo, Dipolog Bishop Jose Manguiran and Borongan Bishop Loenardo Medroso.
To get into the bishops’ blog, simply click www.cbcponline.net. You could also access directly the blog of the bishops by logging on to www.ovc.blogspot.com for Archbishop Cruz’s "Viewpoints", :for Quevedo’s "Perspectives", for Bishop Manguiran’s "The Meaning" and for Bishop Medroso’s "Tidbits". [Source]
I don’t know what I would think if the USCCB decided to do the same. Sure I would love to see a Bruskewitz Blog or one for Bishop Chaput or a multitude of other fine Bishops. A Cardinal Mahony blog would be pretty boring though. After all there are no liturgical abuses there to complain about as Cardinal "no abuses here" Mahony has told us before. And could you imagine the monotony of post after post about the wonders of pastoral assistants and the beauty of cement in architectural designs? Though I guess that would be better than page after page of summaries of priestly abuse that was enabled under his watch. You just know you wouldn’t find EWTN on his blogroll or for that matter this blog.
Speaking of blogrolls, have you ever played blog roll orthodoxy when visiting a new Catholic blog? By their links you will know them. Though this doesn’t work on new blogs where there blogroll says Google and Edit Me.
4 comments
Hey Jeff, that last link is broken.
Hmm… I’d love a blog by my dearly beloved Bishop Bruskewitz. The closest we’ve got is a page on the diocese’s site with some columns and such.
What if a bishop blogrolled you – imagine the honor! And when will the bishop of Rome have a blog?
have you ever played blog roll orthodoxy when visiting a new Catholic blog?
Doesn’t everyone do this? It is the first step I take when dropping by a new place. Though I will let quite a few questionable links slide until I have read the person’s posts for a while. After all, through one person’s desire to blogroll everyone with the word “Catholic” in their name, I have found my blog listed on a particular proudly UNorthodox site … to my chagrin.
I’m trying to, but I – as a German-language Catholic blogger – have rather a different problem: the Catholic blogosphere in German is relatively small, so most of us are bound to have one or two dissenters on our blogrolls (even though the vast majority of German Catholic bloggers is very orthodox).
Even though I’ve tried to exclude the craziest and most blatantly dissenting people from my blogroll, there still may be one or two (out of 10-12 German-language blogs) who seem to have qualms with parts of Catholic teaching (on, surprise!, sexual issues).
Still, I am very happy that, given what one hears otherwise from Catholic circles in everyday life, the German-speaking Catholic blogosphere is remarkably uniform in its orthodoxy.
Much as I would love to read a blog from Bishop Bruskewitz, I think the chances are quite slim. I don’t remember seeing one bit of technology in his office at all…at least, nothing past the regular hard-wired telephone. I’m not sure he even has a cell.