Strength and Kindliness
Making It Real
Did you know?
- The world’s average internet user spends over six and a half hours online each day
- The top three websites visited are Google, YouTube and Facebook
- On average, social media users spend over two hours on social media each day
- Facebook has 2.3 billion active user accounts, YouTube 1.9 billion, WhatsApp 1.5 billion and Instagram 1 billion
- 5 billion people use mobile phones
The last Sunday of September is known as Social Justice Sunday in Australian Catholic Churches. The Australian Catholic Social Justice Council has released an annual social justice statement to mark this occasion since 1940.
The social justice aspect of Christian teaching and action is emphasised at Masses across Australia on this day. The social justice statement that is released to mark the occasion refers to the aspects of Catholic social principles and to issues that the council sees as critical issues for society today.
This year’s Social Justice Statement is titled ‘Making it Real’ and explores the concept of genuine human encounter in our human world.
Pope Francis says this:
The digital world is a public square, a meeting place where we can either encourage or demean one another, engage in meaningful discussion or unfair attacks…. Access to digital networks entails a responsibility for our neighbour whom we do not see but who is nevertheless real and has a dignity which must be respected…. The encounter between communication and mercy will be fruitful to the degree that it generates a closeness which cares, comforts, heals, accompanies and celebrates.
This year’s Social Justice Statement challenges us to consider whether the current information system is contributing to the betterment of the human person, that is, does it make people more spiritually mature, more aware of the dignity of their humanity, more responsible or more open to others, in particular the neediest and the weakest? It asks us to consider our digital world, promotes the common good of all the world’s people. The statement asks us to think about whether our digital world promotes the intrinsic social nature of people, who thrive best when in community with one another.
And it asks us to think about when, how and why the digital world may sometimes look like this:
To learn more visit: https://www.socialjustice.catholic.org.au/files/Order-forms/2019/Social%20Justice%20Statement%202019-20%20WEB.pdf
A prayer from Pope Francis
Lord, make us instruments of your peace.
Help us to recognise the evil latent in a communication that does not build communion.
Help us to remove the venom from our judgements.
Help us to speak about others as our brothers and sisters.
You are faithful and trustworthy; may our words be seeds of goodness for the world:
where there is shouting, let us practise listening;
where there is confusion, let us inspire harmony;
where there is ambiguity, let us bring clarity;
where there is exclusion, let us offer solidarity;
where there is sensationalism, let us use sobriety;
where there is superficiality, let us raise real questions;
where there is prejudice, let us awaken trust;
where there is hostility, let us bring respect;
where there is falsehood, let us bring truth.
Amen.
It’s a challenging read. But it’s a topic we must all take the time to think about…. deeply.
Kirrilee Westblade
Deputy Principal
Catholic Identity
Have you read this Season's edition of Australian Catholics?
https://www.australiancatholics.com.au/current/aust-catholic-magazine
Have your read the current edition of our Diocesan newspaper Sandpiper?