43. Digital campaigns of hatred and destruction, for their part, are not – as some would have us believe – a positive form of mutual support, but simply an association of individuals united against a perceived common enemy. “Digital media can also expose people to the risk of addiction, isolation and a gradual loss of contact with concrete reality, blocking the development of authentic interpersonal relationships”. [46] They lack the physical gestures, facial expressions, moments of silence, body language and even the smells, the trembling of hands, the blushes and perspiration that speak to us and are a part of human communication. Digital relationships, which do not demand the slow and gradual cultivation of friendships, stable interaction or the building of a consensus that matures over time, have the appearance of sociability. Yet they do not really build community; instead, they tend to disguise and expand the very individualism that finds expression in xenophobia and in contempt for the vulnerable. Digital connectivity is not enough to build bridges. It is not capable of uniting humanity.
Pope Francis in Fratelli Tutti, §43
Category: Church
The Catholic Church in Cambodia.
Mass of the Air for the Deaf
Almost fifty years ago, Mass of the Air began broadcasting on Louisville television to allow home-bound people to have at least limited access to Sunday mass. Many volunteers have helped to provide this service, including sign language interpreters and prompters. Above, Nancy Reynolds (L) is signing American Sign Language and Peg Darcy is prompting her to make sure the communications are clear and understandable. Both Nancy and Peg have been part of the Catholic deaf community for more than 40 years, serving our deaf brothers and sisters in many ways.
Candlelight Vigil for Immigrants
Angela Merici and Holy Cross High Schools
Yesterday the 1978 graduating class of Angela Merici High School gathered at Holy Cross High School to dedicate a room the class had furnished. Holy Cross is the result of a merger between Angela Merici and Bishop David High School. I was invited and it was a great evening with the women who were students when I was at Angela Merici during the 1970s and 1980s. Those were really great years for me.
Forgiveness
Rosie’s Funeral
Mike is married to my sister Mary and his mother died last week. Rosie is her name, and although not Catholic, she had asked if I would have a funeral service for her. I was most happy to do that and this afternoon we had a gravesite service and then the family gathered at Mike and Mary’s home. We have a wonderful family and it is exactly for events like this with family that I have returned from Cambodia. Here are some photos of some of our family gathered today.
California Day 7
This morning Jim McLaughlin and I went back to St. Columba Church where the St. Vincent de Paul Society organizes a weekly food distribution for needy and hungry people.
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St. William’s Church
St. William’s is a small dynamic Catholic community in Louisville who really express themselves in their liturgy. Their church is located in what is now an industrial neighborhood but members come from all over Louisville and their service is streamed online for others in 14 states and 6 countries. The spirit is great there and I attended their Sunday celebrations over the years when I was in town. And I attended there yesterday.
Fratelli Tutti: Forgiveness
Speaking of forgiveness: The important thing is not to fuel anger, which is unhealthy for our own soul and the soul of our people, or to become obsessed with taking revenge and destroying the other. No one achieves inner peace or returns to a normal life in that way. The truth is that “no family, no group of neighbors, no ethnic group, much less a nation, has a future if the force that unites them, brings them together and resolves their differences is vengeance and hatred. We cannot come to terms and unite for the sake of revenge, or treating others with the same violence with which they treated us, or plotting opportunities for retaliation under apparently legal auspices”. Nothing is gained this way and, in the end, everything is lost.
Pope Francis in Fratelli Tutti, §242
Fratelli Tutti: Kindness
Kindness frees us from the cruelty that at times infects human relationships, from the anxiety that prevents us from thinking of others, from the frantic flurry of activity that forgets that others also have a right to be happy. Often nowadays we find neither the time nor the energy to stop and be kind to others, to say “excuse me”, “pardon me”, “thank you”. Yet every now and then, miraculously, a kind person appears and is willing to set everything else aside in order to show interest, to give the gift of a smile, to speak a word of encouragement, to listen amid general indifference. If we make a daily effort to do exactly this, we can create a healthy social atmosphere in which misunderstandings can be overcome and conflict forestalled. Kindness ought to be cultivated; it is no superficial bourgeois virtue. Precisely because it entails esteem and respect for others, once kindness becomes a culture within society it transforms lifestyles, relationships and the ways ideas are discussed and compared. Kindness facilitates the quest for consensus; it opens new paths where hostility and conflict would burn all bridges.
Pope Francis, in Fratelli Tutti, §224