Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD - Evangelizing Communication in the Light of Ecclesia in Asia

Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD
Evangelizing Communication in the Light of Ecclesia in Asia

To evangelize means to communicate. Evangelization is sharing of faith experiences with others. Evangelii Nuntiandi (EN) says it is the communication of "the Good News into all strata of humanity and through its influence transforming humanity from within, making it new" (No.18). This communication of the Good News happens already in a first step through the witness of life as "an initial act of Evangelization" (No.21). But it needs also the explicit communication about the Lord Jesus Christ:

"There is no true evangelization if the name, the teaching, the life, the promises, the kingdom ands the mystery of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God are not communicated!"(EN, No. 22).

Evangelizing communication begins with knowing the situation of people, their expectations, dispositions and life situations into which the message is to be communicated and shared. Only from here can also the means and methods be determined which are to be applied and used.

I. The Situation

In the situation of Asia the special synod of bishops in Rome (1998) as well as the final document of this gathering, the Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in Asia take up these challenges and refer in several ways directly or indirectly to evangelizing communication (1).

1. In describing the "Economic and Social Realities" of Asia, Ecclesia in Asia deplores the negative influence of the Mass Media but also " the way they are controlled and used by those with questionable political, economic and ideological interests". The media are seen as "threatening traditional values, especially the stability of the family. The effect of images of violence, hedonism, unbridled individualism and materialism ‘is striking at the heart of Asian cultures, at the religious character of the people, families and whole societies’ (Asian Synod: Instrumenum Laboris, IL 9). This is a situation which poses a great challenge to the Church and to the proclamation of her message" (No. 7).

Later, Ecclesia in Asia again refers to the "intrusiveness of the Mass Media" as one of the "degrading forms of exploitation and manipulation" which make people easily slaves to the powerful" (No. 39).

We can not escape this reality! How do we as Church take up these challenges and how should our proclamation be in such a situation? How could we, in some ways, concretely react and respond?

Strengthen traditional values, especially the stability of the family with more personal care, imagination and creativity according to local situations and possibilities. This calls for creative persons, priests, religious and lay who are not just administrators and bookkeepers but have the willingness to ‘listen’ and also the courage to "test new waters". In a special way, they should listen and understand the language, feelings and needs of young people, born into the media ‘culture’ and growing up with the computer mouse.
In a similar way, consider the plight of the poor, work for justice and peace, and help to preserve the integrity of creation. "There is no peace without justice, and no justice without forgiveness" Pope John Paul II said in his New Year Angelus message 2002. "Together we must firmly oppose the temptation of hatred and violence, that only give the illusion of solving conflicts but instead causes real and permanent damage. Instead forgiveness, that can appear to be weakness, demands great spiritual strength and guarantees long-term advantages" (2).

2. Asia can also not escape globalization, which is promoted through media and modern communication technologies. The dynamics of globalization are "quickly drawing Asian societies into a global consumer culture that is both secularistic and materialistic "which easily leads to eroding of traditional family and social values which until now had sustained people and societies…" (No.39). Ecclesia in Asia at the same time insists on the need for "globalization without marginalization". In such a situation:

"Dialogue between cultures is especially needed today because of the impact of new communication technology on the lives of individuals and peoples. Ours is an era of global communication, which is shaping society along the lines of new cultural models which more or less break with past models. At least in principle, accurate and up to date information is available to anyone in any part of the world. The free flow of images and speech on the global scale is transforming not only political and economic relations between peoples, but even our understanding of the world. It opens up a range of hitherto unthinkable possibilities, but it also has certain negative and dangerous aspects…" (John Paul II Message for World Peace Day 2001, No.11).

Such a ‘Dialogue between Cultures’ is part of the triple dialogue promoted since years by the "Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences" (FABC) together with the Dialogue with Religions and Dialogue with the Poor. In fact together with strengthening traditional values there must also be openness to new developments and values, positive and negative, of other global cultures. We can not live any more in isolation but must be open in understanding and accepting others without loosing our own identity. Ecclesia in Asia shows the direction in saying:

"Being Asian is best discovered and affirmed not in confrontation and opposition, but in the spirit of complementarity and harmony. In this framework … the Church can communicate the Gospel in a way which is faithful both to her own tradition and to the Asian soul" (No.6).

The reality of communications in Asia is not only threatening but it is also challenging and a great chance for the evangelizing work of the Church.

3. In a special section on social communication, Ecclesia in Asia (No. 48) comes back to the vision of social communication in the Mission encyclical Redemptoris Missio (1990) where the media are called the "first Areopagus" (market-place) of the modern times. They "have become so important as to be for many the chief means of information and education, of guidance and inspiration in their behavior as individuals, families and within society at large. In particular the younger generation is growing up in a world conditioned by the Mass Media". From here, Ecclesia in Asia concludes: "The exceptional role played by the means of social communication in shaping the world, its cultures and ways of thinking has led to rapid and far-reaching changes in Asian societies." (No. 48) They create a "new culture" which also lives in modern Asia and brings another important dimension to evangelizing communication (cf. III, 5 below).

II. Ways of Evangelizing Communication

Evangelization in Asia can not do without the modern means of social communication. Already in Evangelii Nuntiandi (1975) Pope Paul VI stated: "The Church would feel guilty before the Lord if she did not utilize these powerful means that human skill is daily rendering more perfect" (No. 45).

Ecclesia in Asia puts this into the evangelization perspective by stating: "Since the Mass Media have an ever increasing influence even in remote areas of Asia, they can assist greatly in the proclamation of the Gospel to every corner of the continent" (No. 48).

This is not a simple matter but calls for ways of "thoroughly integrating the mass media into the pastoral planning and activity, so that by their effective use the Gospel’s power can reach out still further to individuals and entire peoples and infuse Asian cultures with the values of the kingdom" (No. 48). In many places communication apostolates are still separate and not sufficiently integrated into other Church activities like biblical apostolate, catechesis and education.

The further details given in Ecclesia in Asia for evangelization indicate some directions though they are mainly referring to the internal communication within the Church and its better organization. They are the following:

Each diocese should have "where possible, a communications and media office". This was already indicated by the Vatican II decree Inter Mirifica (No. 20) and requested by the Pastoral Instruction Communio et Progressio (1971; Nos. 168ff.).
Media Education, which is less the use of media for education but rather the education for the use of media "including the critical evaluation of media output, needs to be an increasing part of the formation of priests, seminarians, religious, catechists, lay professionals, students in Catholic schools and parish communities". In some countries this is also called "Media Literacy" which enables us to critically and responsibly ‘read’ and perceive the media messages. Sometimes we are we simply "blind" spectators, just uncritical consumers of media or as "The Straits Times" of Singapore recently wrote about South Korean youth on the Internet "turning into broadband zombies" addicted to computer games (3).
Ecumenical and inter-religious cooperation is needed "given the wide influence and extraordinary impact of the mass media" to "ensure a place for spiritual and moral values in the media".
The development of pastoral plans for communications "at the diocesan and national levels" following the Pastoral Instruction Aetatis Novae is encouraged. They must, however, pay "appropriate attention to the circumstances prevailing in Asia".
A very concrete and effective example of evangelizing communication for the Church in Asia is Radio Veritas Asia (RVA). While some of the programs in 17 different Asian languages are aired more for internal Church use, like the Mandarin Program for the ‘underground’ Church in China, most of the programs are aired for people outside the Church. Thus e.g. some 90% of the listeners in the five languages of the Indian subcontinent (Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali. Urdu) are Hindus and Moslems. They appreciate the programs as can be seen and experienced at regular listeners’ meetings in the target areas. Ecclesia in Asia rightly commends "Radio Veritas Asia" as "the only continent-wide radio station for the Church in Asia" and demands that "efforts must be made to strengthen this excellent instrument of mission, through appropriate language programming, personnel and financial help from Episcopal conferences and dioceses in Asia" (No. 48).

Since the "Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences" (FABC) is responsible for RVA’s operations and financing, the different bishops’ conferences have a special obligation, including those who do not directly profit from a single language program for their territory.

"Language Program Boards" in the different target areas try to involve local bishops and others in a special way to contribute to program planning, production, training and financing of the individual language programs. At the FABC General Assembly in Bandung 1990 the presidents of the member bishops’ conferences signed an agreement, to shoulder within five years fully the expenses of all RVA radio programs made in the production centers of their countries. Unfortunately, this was not realized. (4)

III. Dispositions for Evangelizing Communication

The proper use of the modern communication means for reaching the vast majority of Asians who are not part of the Church is not, first and foremost, a question of skills. More so, it needs certain dispositions and dimensions. Real evangelization starts with ‘conversion’ within the Church but this has to be shared also with the ‘outside’. It is not just to build and use technical means like the mass media but it begins with the basics of human and Christian communication.

1. The witness of life is the first requirement for evangelizing communication in Asia. Here more than ever, the words of Pope Paul VI in Evangelii Nuntiandi (No. 41, cf. also 21,76) apply:

"Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses. Saint Peter expressed this well when he held up the example of a reverent and chaste life that wins over even without a word those who refuse to obey the word (cf. 1 Pt 3:1). It is therefore primarily by her conduct and by her life that the Church will evangelize the world. In other words, by her living witness of fidelity to the Lord Jesus — the witness of poverty and detachment, of freedom in the face of the powers of this world, in short, the witness of sanctity" that the Church communicates.

The more recent example for Asia is Mother Teresa of Calcutta. She evangelized simply through her life. For Christian communication, this means that we should not only be concerned about technology. Our inner disposition and attitude of human communication must be based on a deep spiritual experience. Following the description of communication in the Pastoral Instruction Communio et Progressio (No.11), the deepest sense of our communication must be a "giving of self in love".

Such witness of life often also leads to ‘personal contact’ as a basic means for communicating evangelization. "The whole book of the Acts of the Apostles as the first book on the communicating early Church reports and testifies how the faith grew in the whole world of those days through witness and personal contact as the main means of evangelizing. Even without the mass media the world of those days became evangelized in a short time and grew far beyond the Jewish community to Greece and Rome and up to Spain. Many texts in the Acts of the Apostles are reports and examples of evangelizing communication. And Pope Paul VI reminds us again in Evangelii Nuntiandi (1975) that the Lord himself used this way of communicating and therefore "it must not happen that the pressing need to proclaim the Good News to the multitudes should make us forget this form of proclamation whereby an individual’s conscience is reached an touched by an entirely unique word that he receives from someone else." (No. 46)

Examples of such witness and personal contact include concrete manifestations of ecumenism and cooperation with other religions for peace and the common good. It is less word which ‘speaks’ but even more the deeds!

2. Evangelizing communication must further be backed up through the corporate image of the Church as an institution but also through the public image of a single faith community and her members. Already the Pastoral Instruction Communio et Progressio proposed to apply for this the principles of Public Relations and Aetatis Novae demands it for pastoral planning (No. 31). For evangelizing communicators, it means to "consider the sort of audience they (the public) are, at various times, addressing and establishing relationship that is based on mutual trust and understanding". But "this can only be obtained as long as people have a genuine regard and consideration for one another and a scrupulous respect for the truth" (C+P 174).

This means not only the application of those techniques of Public Relations or also the principles of Business Communication but it finally boils down again to the ‘witness of life’ as the first condition because Public Relations means: Do good and talk about it. This becomes very concrete in Asia when EA reminds us:

"In Asia, home to great religions where individuals and entire peoples are thirsting for the divine, the Church is called to be a praying Church, deeply spiritual even as she engages in immediate human and social concerns. All Christians need a true missionary spirituality of prayer and contemplation. A genuinely religious person readily wins respect and a following in Asia…" (No. 23).

How far are we (ourselves and our communities) really such "genuinely religious" to become the basis for good ‘Public Relations’?

3. Evangelizing communication in Asia is further based on Inculturation. Ways of thinking, values and communication means, ways and structures of Asian cultures must be the basis and background for any Christian communication. Thus, "narrative methods akin to Asian cultural forms" should be applied because "the proclamation of Jesus Christ can most effectively be made by narrating his story as the gospels do"(No.20). Along with this, the Church and evangelizers "must be open to new and surprising ways in which the face of Jesus might be presented in Asia".

This is in a special way important for the initial stage of Evangelization as great Asian missionaries like Giovanni of Montecorvino, Matteo Ricci or Robert de Nobili have exemplified "the penetrating insight into peoples and their cultures" (EA, No. 20). They set shining examples of respect but also for incorporating local cultures into their Christian mission. They laid the ground for a positive approach to Christianity, which unfortunately was partly destroyed through the narrow mindedness of some Church officials at that time.

In a broader sense, one might see also a similar attitude in ‘inculturating’ modern communications into our ministry as Pope John Paul II does in his world Communication Day message 2002 on the "Internet: A new forum for proclaiming the Gospel" (5):

"The Internet can offer magnificent opportunities for Evangelization if used with competence and a clear awareness of its strengths and weaknesses. Above all, by providing information and stirring interest it makes possible an initial encounter with the Christian message, especially among the young who increasingly turn to the world of cyberspace as a window on the world. It is important, therefore, that the Christian Community think of very practical ways of helping those who first make contact through the Internet to move from the virtual world of cyberspace to the real world of Christian community".

But also in the second stage of evangelization the teaching of faith proper in catechesis and religious instruction evangelizing communication demands an inculturated approach. Ecclesia in Asia reminds us that here "an evocative pedagogy, using stories, parables and symbols so characteristic in Asian methodology in teaching" should be adapted.

The need for inculturation is also demanded by the basic communications principle of taking the recipient serious and to meet her/him in the reality of her/his life. Therefore, evangelizing communication in Asia has "to take the situation of the listener at heart" and must be "adapted to the listener’s level of maturity and in appropriate form and language… to evangelize in a way that appeals to the sensitivities of Asian peoples". Images of Jesus should be presented "which would be intelligible to Asian minds and cultures" (No. 20).

4. Evangelizing communication in Asia grounds on deep spirituality. His travels to Asia confirmed Pope John Paul II’s view "that the future of mission depends to a great extent on contemplation. Unless the missionary is a contemplative he cannot proclaim Christ in a credible way" (EA, 23, cf. RM, 91).

This must also be the basis for any evangelizing communication and for every Christian communicator in Asia. After all, our evangelizing communication is basically the sharing of spiritual experiences. Mission, as evangelizing communication, is "contemplative action and active contemplation… A missionary who has no deep experience of God in prayer and contemplation will have little spiritual influence or missionary success" the Pope writes in Ecclesia in Asia (No. 23). This is equally true for any Christian communicator. Communication and proclamation in Asia needs "holy men and women who will make the Savior known and loved through their lives. A fire can only be lit by something that is itself on fire…". The last chapter of Pope John Paul II’s mission encyclical Redemptoris Missio deals in a special way with a spirituality that starts with the docility to the Holy Spirit (Nos. 87-91).

Studying Church documents on Social Communication at the Graduate School of the University of Santo Tomas (UST) in Manila, we discovered from the writings of St. Augustine on communication (De Doctrina Cristiana; De Catechezandis Rudibus) a Christian communication model which differs from the Sender-Message-Receiver model usually taught in communication classes (6). The Christian Communication Model starts with the Message going through the messenger to the Receiver:

In any Christian and especially in evangelizing communication the Word of God, the Message of salvation, stays central. It is God who speaks, and the messenger is only in the service of this message. Such a view has consequences for every Christian but especially for any communicator. The more s/he listens and is filled with the message the better s/he fulfills her/his mission as a messenger. This is the challenge of deep spirituality as a pre-condition for any evangelizing and Christian communication.

5. The special section on social communication in Ecclesia in Asia (No. 48) refers to Pope John Paul II’s conviction of modern social communication as being a marketplace, the "areopagus" creating a "new culture". The Church and established institutions like the family do not anymore determine the values and ways of living especially of young people. It is rather this "areopagus" of modern communication which in a growing way determines life and values of people. Evangelizing communication must be aware that modern communication creates a ‘new culture’, "which originates not just from whatever content is eventually expressed, but from the very fact that there exist new ways of communicating, with new languages, new techniques and a new psychology" (Redemptoris Missio, 37c). If evangelizing communication does not seriously study these new conditions, eventually it will not be able to really communicate and play a role in the marketplace of modern life.

For all of us there arise some challenging questions: How far do we seriously study these new ways, new languages, technologies and psychology? Are we also individually and as communities aware of such realities in our own lives? Are our Catholic universities and institutions of higher learning taking up such studies or do they (and we) get stuck admiring and using new technologies without being critical and going deeper?

Our attitude to all this has important consequences for evangelization! If we do not want only to be part of but also influence and shape this "new culture" we have to be at the fore of research and study. Redemptoris Missio says "it is not enough to use the media simply to spread the Christian Message and the Church’s authentic teaching".

Up till now it might have been our main concern just to use modern media. But in today’s world, these media are more than just only some new and modern instruments of social communication…! They shape our world and not only in an urban but in a growing way also in rural settings. In the countryside of Tamil Nadu (India) one can see e.g. several small groups of 5 to 8 wooden houses with satellite dishes in their midst! This concern was precisely the reason why some invited Catholic academicians in a ‘Roundtable’ organized by the FABC Office of Social Communication 1999 at Assumption University in Bangkok proposed an "Agenda for Church/Religion and Social Communication Research in Asia". The proposal includes an "Asian Research Center for Religion and Social Communication" (ARC), which was established in the same year at St. John’s University, Bangkok (7). Unfortunately we still lack up till now committed and qualified Christian academicians to probe deeper into this situation.

The Pope takes this issue up again in detail in his World Communication Day message for 2002 on the "Internet: A New Forum for Proclaiming the Gospel". Instead of referring to the old Greek ‘Areopagus’ like in Redemptoris Missio, he refers here to the Roman parallel the "Forum" which he describes as "that public space where politics and business were transacted, where religious duties were fulfilled, where much of social life of the city took place, and where the best and the worst of human nature was on display," which is also the fact in the case of Internet today.

From all this he concludes that "for the Church the new world of cyberspace is a summons to the great adventure of using its potential to proclaim the Gospel message. This challenge is at the heart of what it means at the beginning of the Millennium to follow the Lord’s command to ‘put out into the deep’ (Lk 5:4)". But we are also reminded that the mere accumulation of information and new possibilities for human contacts are not enough to replace finally the "direct human contact required for genuine evangelization. For evangelization always depends upon the personal witness of the one who is sent to evangelize (cf. Rom 10:14,15)".

The challenge of evangelizing communication also in Asia is: "How does the Church lead from the kind of contact made possible by the Internet to the deeper communication demanded by Christian proclamation? How do we build upon the first contact and exchange of information the Internet makes possible?" (WCD 2002).

6. From all this follows the need for a proper formation of evangelizing communicators who need more than technical skills. Despite all the technical realities coming from the West we still have to integrate any communication training and formation into the our Asian conditions and realities as Ecclesia in Asia demands from evangelizers (No. 23):

"In the past, formation often followed the style, methods and programs imported from the West. While appreciating the service rendered by that mode of formation, the Synod Fathers recognized as a positive development the efforts made in recent times to adapt the formation of evangelizers to the cultural contexts of Asia…".

In practical terms this means also a greater emphasis on training evangelizing communicators in Asia itself instead of sending them for studies outside their own environment to other continents and cultures. Ecclesia in Asia (No. 22) underlines here not only the obligations of bishops, priests, seminarians and religious but also the role of the laity:

"It is above all they who are called to transform society…by infusing the ‘mind of Christ’ into the mentality, customs, laws and structures of the secular world in which they live. A wider inculturation of the Gospel at every level of society in Asia will depend greatly on the appropriate formation which the local Churches succeed in giving to the laity".

Beyond the ‘witness of life’ all people related to the evangelizing mission of the Church must have a basic knowledge in social communication, which everyone who wants to be part of an evangelizing Church needs. Already the Council Fathers of Vatican II asked in the decree on Social Communication Inter Mirifica (No. 13) that "all the members of the Church should make a concerted effort to ensure that the means of communication are put at the service of the multiple forms of the apostolate without delay and as energetically as possible, where and when it is needed…. Pastors of souls should be particularly zealous in this field, since it is closely linked with their task of preaching the Gospel…".

This is followed up by the Pastoral Instructions Communio et Progressio (1971, Nos. 106, 108, 111) and Aetatis Novae (1992, No. 18). It should lead us according to Ecclesia in Asia (No.48) to "explore ways of thoroughly interpreting the Mass Media into her (the Church’s) pastoral planning and activity, so that by their effective use the Gospel’s power can reach out still further to individuals and entire peoples, and infuse Asian cultures with the values of the Kingdom". This is not only an obligation for communicators but for every Christian, especially Church leaders. We all must first learn and practice to be communicative persons on the human and later, also to some extent, on the technical level.

IV. Evangelizing in Mass communication

What does all this now mean for the Mass communication? Media will continue to dominate our lives. They will give us news, information and especially entertainment. For evangelizing communication, it depends very much on how we re-act to such a modern ‘marketplace’.

We can own such media, and somehow follow the trend. The Church owns now such an instrument in "Radio Veritas Asia", and in some places local radio stations but also newspapers and publications.
We can also try to get into existing media enterprises. We might offer or sell our own productions, put some qualified personnel and ideas at their disposal, or offer financial support. This will be especially possible in commercial media systems.
It all calls for qualified persons who are at par with secular professionals in terms of communication skills and also communications management.
It means discovering, developing and promoting talents especially from our young, as well as looking for good training and formation possibilities. Our Catholic educational institutions could offer special training programs and we should have thus also an opportunity to discover and promote such talents.
Pastoral care should be extended to those Christians already working in media. They rightly expect from fellow Christians and especially from Church leaders moral and professional support. They can be of great help in the pre-evangelization of persons and communities.

We should further be aware of recent professional developments, which point to a move from mass media communication to simple media communication. In a growing way, it is not any more the mass media nourishing the ‘masses’. Through digitalization in broadcasting and personalization of communication in the Internet, communication is more directed to specialized audiences. Digitalization multiplies the TV and radio channels considerably and thus, leads to more specialized programs e.g. news, information, sports, movies, lifestyle but also religious programs like in some places the "Eternal Word Television Network" (EWTN) of Mother Angelica or some Protestant programs. Specialized programs increase interactivity with recipients and thus open new possibilities for evangelizing communication (8).

Conclusion

Concluding its section on social communication, the Instrumentum Laboris (No. 53) for the special Synod on Asia (1998) sees the challenge of the "Mass Media for the Church in Asia in three concrete areas of action:

The Church in Asia needs to increase her presence in the world of Mass Media in order to communicate the Gospel message as well as the social and moral teachings of the Magisterium;
The Church needs to enter into the ‘modern areopagus’ through the means of social communications in order to evangelize society and transform, through the values of the Gospel, the new culture being shaped by the means of social communication; and
All Church personnel, both clerical and lay, need to receive adequate exposure and training in the use of the mass media and means of social communication. At the same time, the Gospel must be brought into the lives of those who control and those who are engaged in the Mass Media in different ways".

These are very good proposals. But with all this, we should not forget that social communication is not just one activity within the evangelization process. It is an essential and integral part of any evangelization. For a long time we have been very much "tool-oriented" and looked at communication and especially the mass media as a means for evangelization. In our understanding today, this is by far not enough. Pope John Paul declared already in Redemptoris Missio (37c) that "it is not enough to use the media simply to spread the Christian message".

The reality of a "new culture" should also remind us that any evangelization has a communication dimension, or rather is communication. Yes, we also use the means but we should be very much aware that beyond this, it is our life, our testimony, our total behavior and our communicative attitude that determines, beside God’s Grace, the ‘success’ of any evangelization. In the Spirit of the early Church where everybody was a missionary, also today every Christian in Asia must be an ‘evangelizing communicator’.

Evangelizing communication starts with the witness of life, leading to personal contact, reflects Christian life to the outside and is embedded into the local cultures without denying global influences. Such communication can only be genuine if it is based on a deep spirituality, which lives out of the docility to the Holy Spirit. Evangelizing communication is a special challenge for the formation of Christian messengers and cannot neglect a ‘new culture’ created by the media and especially the new communication technologies.

Cardinal Sepe, the prefect of the Vatican Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples has emphasized the role and importance of evangelizing communication for his congregation in an interview for World Mission Sunday 2002 (9):

"The early Church saw the roads of the Roman Empire, certainly not build for her, as a providential gift for embarking on evangelization. The apostles, who received from the Lord the command to ‘go out into the whole world and preach the gospel to every creature’, did not hesitate to use those imperial means of communication to spread the word of God. Today the modern technology offers new roads, which we must all use since they will help us to launch truly unprecedented networks. ‘Such a wide audience would have been beyond the wildest imaginings of those who preached the gospel before us. Therefore, what is needed in our time is an active and imaginative engagement of the media by the Church. Catholics should not be afraid to throw open the doors of social communications to Christ, so that his Good News may be heard from the housetops of the world’ (John Paul II, World Communication Day message 2001). The Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples looks with particular attention to this ocean of possibilities offered by the media; we proceed with audacity – as the Pope says in his call to ‘put out into the deep’ and we must ask the Lord to give us the strength and the courage to implement pastoral and spiritual initiatives suited to modern times, which allow us to use to the maximum effect the tools offered by the information culture, strengthened by confidence in the word of Jesus".

Pope John Paul refers to this when he concludes his World Communication Day message 2002 with the following words: "The Internet causes billions of images to appear on millions of computer monitors around the planet…From this galaxy of sight and sound will the face of Christ emerge and the voice of Christ be heard? For it is only when his face is seen and his voice heard that the world will know the glad tidings of our redemption. This is the purpose of evangelization".

Notes

1. Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD: Social Communication at the Asian Synod: A Documentation — Social Communication in "Ecclesia in Asia" and recent FABC Documents. In Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD (Ed.). (2002). Church and Social Communication in Asia. Documents, Analysis, Experiences. FABC-OSC Book No. 1. Manila: Logos Publications, pp. 85 – 122.

2. L’Osservatore Romano, English edition January 9, 2002, p. 3.

3. The Straits Times, Singapore, October 11, 2002 p. H12 (based on a New York Times report): "…Critics say the burgeoning industry (of online video games clubs) is creating millions of zombie-like addicts who are turning into computer games and dropping out of school and traditional group activities, becoming uncommunicative and even violent because of the electronic games they play…Young people are loosing the ability to relate to others, except through games. People who become addicted are prone to violence, even when they are not playing…".

4. FABC Covenant on "Radio Veritas Asia". In: RVA Since 1969. Silver Jubilee Memorabilia. Manila, 1994, p. 43.

5. Cf. Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD (Ed.) Church and Social Communication. Supplement I. Basic Documents 1998-2002. Manila: Logos Publications, 2002. pp. 84-86.

6. Cf. Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD (2002): Communicating in Community, An Introduction to Social Communication. Third revised and enlarged Edition. Manila: Logos/Divine Word, 2002, p. 32 f.

7. Cf. Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD (Ed.). (2002): Church and Social Communication in Asia. Documents, Analysis, Experiences. FABC-OSC Book No. 1. Manila: Logos Publications, pp. 49-58.

8. James Kofski, MM. The Asian Research Center for Religion and Social Communication. In: Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD (Ed.). (2002): Church and Social Communication in Asia. Documents, Analysis, Experiences. FABC-OSC Book No. 1. Manila: Logos Publications, pp. 129-134.

9. Cf. Franz-Josef Eilers, SVD (2002): Communicating in Community, An Introduction to Social Communication. Third revised and enlarged Edition. Manila: Logos/Divine Word, p. 79.

10. In: Agenzia Internazionale Fides, October 2, 2002; also: ZENIT News Agency, October 23 and 24, 2002.

Ref.: Text from the Author for SEDOS.