Goodbye, Good Bloggers?
In a first, one of the most prominent American seminaries -- Mount St. Mary's in Emmitsburg, Md. -- has banned its students from blogging. As if you needed me to tell you the levels of skittishness and hissy-fits any form of media or independent commentary causes in the institutional mindset of this business, don't be surprised if it's the first of many.
Of course, there are the pros for the ban, such as the dangers of one's full investment in seminary life; the aversion of dioceses to having private statements from those in their formation coming back to haunt; and the nature of how things posted on blogs can often be misinterpreted or taken out of context. (And advancing too far with new technology isn't the easiest thing when you've got committed Victorians in the house....)
But at the same time, there are the "drawbacks" to sems blogging on their own... A blog might just be a good tool in which a sem can practice preaching with a broad audience. A readership and their feedback would give him the outlet and expose him from behind those forbidding semgates to the world in which he will minister. And the presence of sems on their own blogs -- and I dare you that dioceses will set up puppet blogs just to exploit this effect -- gives the Catholic people hope. It gives the faithful contact with the next generation of priesthood and imbues them with a good feeling about the life of the church. Look at how hopped up CWR got the other day about numbers. Not quality, not holiness -- numbers.
Where does everyone stand on sems and blogs? Let's mash it up.
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Of course, there are the pros for the ban, such as the dangers of one's full investment in seminary life; the aversion of dioceses to having private statements from those in their formation coming back to haunt; and the nature of how things posted on blogs can often be misinterpreted or taken out of context. (And advancing too far with new technology isn't the easiest thing when you've got committed Victorians in the house....)
But at the same time, there are the "drawbacks" to sems blogging on their own... A blog might just be a good tool in which a sem can practice preaching with a broad audience. A readership and their feedback would give him the outlet and expose him from behind those forbidding semgates to the world in which he will minister. And the presence of sems on their own blogs -- and I dare you that dioceses will set up puppet blogs just to exploit this effect -- gives the Catholic people hope. It gives the faithful contact with the next generation of priesthood and imbues them with a good feeling about the life of the church. Look at how hopped up CWR got the other day about numbers. Not quality, not holiness -- numbers.
Where does everyone stand on sems and blogs? Let's mash it up.
-30-
posted by Rocco Palmo at 10:19
3 Comments:
The downside to seminarian blogs is huge. I've been in and around the St. Blog's scene for well over three years. There have been many occasions when innocent blog comments have been blown out of proportion and that simply among us lumbering laymen. Seminarians - not yet expert in the office politics that will have such a huge impact on their futures - are very vulnerable to the consequences of misinterpretations.
Pseudonymity could do some good in mitigating some of the risks from the seminarian standpoint, but opens the seminaries themselves up to the possibility of having some dirty laundry aired in public.
A pseudonymous group blog with both student and faculty participation could be the safest, but of course the least juicy. Still, seminary blogs need not necessarily be about the juice.
I recall a group blog by some Nashotah House (Episcopal) seminarians in which they posted funny pictures of ugly women priests and making catty comments, some of which were funny, but most were gratuitously insulting. They ended up getting into serious trouble, though I do not think they were given the boot.
It's probably just as well that the Mount made the decision that it did.
I love reading sem blogs, some were/are excellent. There is a list at my blog - http://revertedxer.blogspot.com/2005/08/goodbye-to-quodibeta-due-to-new.html
I found most to be tame, and think blogs can be an excellent outlet for sems. Perhaps the culture of St. Blogs could be a bit harsh, but it's nothing compared to the world the sems will be a part of when (God-willing) they are ordained.
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