John Paul II Used Technology to Shepherd His Flock

c. 2005 Religion News Service (UNDATED) It may be a stretch to call him “the cyber pope,” but John Paul II will be remembered for embracing electronic technology to reach his flock. An actor in his youth, John Paul was the star of the Vatican Television Center, which sent video of him around the globe. […]

c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) It may be a stretch to call him “the cyber pope,” but John Paul II will be remembered for embracing electronic technology to reach his flock.

An actor in his youth, John Paul was the star of the Vatican Television Center, which sent video of him around the globe. His prayers, chants and homilies in assorted languages were set to New Age beats on CDs.


Through an Italian company, the Vatican last year offered the pontiff’s “Thought of the Day” to cell phone customers of Verizon Wireless, Cingular and T-Mobile, for 30 cents per text message. Papal words of devotion and inspiration already were available on the Vatican’s elaborate Web site.

There was talk of naming a seventh-century saint, Isidore of Seville, patron saint of the Internet. John Paul was photographed peering into a laptop computer, and the Vatican posted an e-mail address for the public to use in sending him get-well wishes. When the pontiff died April 2, the Vatican informed the media via SMS text messages and e-mail.

Though conservative on science issues such as stem-cell research, John Paul clearly grasped the Web’s power to convey age-old teachings of the Catholic Church to generations in a new millennium.

“The Internet can offer magnificent opportunities for evangelization if used with competence and a clear awareness of its strengths and weaknesses,” the pope said in a message released on World Communications Day in 2002.

Daring the church to “put out into the deep of the Net,” John Paul compared the Internet to an ancient Roman forum where “the best and the worst of human nature was on display.”

The pope urged regulations to curb “degrading and damaging” uses of the Web. He cautioned against a digital divide between rich and poor, and warned of technology’s power to mesmerize. Facts, he said, are no substitute for values; cyberspace shouldn’t be a refuge from personal responsibility and commitment.

Humans “have a vital need for time and inner quiet to ponder and examine life and its mysteries,” the pope wrote.


In other words: Log off sometimes.

John Paul loved tradition. But he remained open to technological advances “as long as it promoted the dignity of the human person,” said the Rev. Anthony Figueiredo, an associate professor at Seton Hall University.

From 1996 to 2001, Figueiredo was a special assistant to the pope at gatherings of bishops. He said he never saw the pope, who was in failing health, use cell phones or the Internet.

“One of his great innovations was to use the media and technology in order to spread the message, the good news. … But for himself, he wanted a one-to-one relationship” with the public, Figueiredo said.

The pope’s reliance on new media had precedent. The church viewed the printing press as a threat _ then embraced it as a “powerful tool of orthodoxy,” said Paul Saffo, director of the Institute for the Future, a nonprofit technology research group in California.

Although John Paul was “by far the most media-savvy pope in history,” Saffo said via e-mail, the first truly “cybergenic pope” has yet to come.

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

John Paul strove to mend fences with the scientific community by rehabilitating Galileo _ more than 350 years after the physicist’s persecution by the church.


“I think this pope was more open to scientists and to scientific explanation than his predecessors,” said Donald Kennedy, editor of Science magazine and former president of Stanford University, via e-mail.

“He invited serious scientists to discuss the stem-cell issue, but those who participated felt that the response, delivered by a Vatican spokesperson, was essentially unresponsive to the arguments that had been made. I would have loved to discuss the teaching of evolution in the schools with him, but I’m not aware that anyone actually did that,” Kennedy said.

MO/JL/PH END COUGHLIN

(Kevin Coughlin covers technology for The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J.)

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