The average diocese does not have any social media co-ordination beyond the diocesan curia/office and the average parish does not have much social media co-ordination beyond the parish office. To not see that social media is something that is more truly a lay apostolate than a clerical one is a mistake. Let's fix that! Please.

It is past time that something was done to promote and co-ordinate what I call 'soft evangelisation' at a diocesan level.

'Soft evangelism' is using social media to provide reminders of God to the unchurched. The aim is to get trickles of good Catholic content into the Facebook, Twitter and RSS feeds of people who live in your diocese; so that among the Aunt Acid jokes, pet pictures and holiday snaps would be an article about the Pope's latest homily, an image of the mother of Jesus, and a photo from a local parish event. Things that people can easily flick through, and opt in for a read if they wish, but which even for that very brief moment are reminders that God exists.

Soft evangelisation has the capacity to plant seeds of faith that one-to-one evangelisation and/or parish evangelisation can later reap.

Current Situation
By and large our social media reach is very poor. Perhaps a tenth of parishes using social media well. Among the less than 10% of priests who are using Facebook, not many of them are taking hold of its evangelistic potential. Even in the pews social media use for evangelisation is weak. I can count on the fingers of one hand, out of a parish with around 800 at weekend Masses, those who are regularly trickling holy content into their Facebook feeds. 
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Facebook
Facebook is very good for getting out messages to local people. A significant percentage of a person's Facebook contacts will live in the same parish, and those contacts will also be in contact with another set of local people. A single message about pre-Christmas Reconciliation times could have a large reach if it was liked by even 2 or 3 people; and it would get to people who don't have access to the parish bulletin and who would never think of looking up a parish website. Even doubling the number of people in our parish intentionally using Facebook for soft evangelisation would make a big impact.

Twitter
Twitter is less local and more international than Facebook, and apart from myself and the local guru for evangelisation in the diocesan curia, I have yet to find anyone else in my own diocese regularly using it for evangelical purposes. Your situation is likely to be similar. If you want to find out where the thinkers, writers and creatives are, then Twitter is the place. I am very impressed with what @BhamCatholics is doing with Twitter from the other side of the globe.

Blogging
Blogging is lamentably the same. Apart from one blogger with whom I often disagree, I don't know anyone else in my diocese who is regularly blogging Catholic content. But they must exist. The difficult thing is that for a blog to succeed it needs a minimum of 2.5 years of regularly published content, and most bloggers don't persevere that long. Any blog-post has a much longer lifespan than a Facebook post or a Tweet.

It is an apostolate (lay ministry)
Apart from priests and deacons, who preach the Word of God mostly within church walls, those believers who are intentionally using social media for evangelical purposes are the front line troops in the culture war and battle for souls. It is more than time that these believers who up until now have been lone rangers fighting the good fight and lacking encouragement (and support for when they get attacked by 'trolls') were officially connected into the mission of the church and the mission of the diocese.

Anyone in ministry/apostolate needs mutual support and encouragement, and also needs direction and inspiration.

There are global networks, like the Guild of St Titus Brandsma and the Catholic Bloggers Network, but after no many solitary hours at the keyboard you really need face-to-face local support.

Get it co-ordinated
Just like Fr Michael White at The Nativity in North Baltimore of 'Rebuilt' fame prepares messages to be taken up and integrated into the various parish ministries, a bishop should be in contact with his bloggers and social media evangelists, and able to give them topics and resources to work with. So that together they are all working towards the same broad-brush message plan.

For example: a plan for August-October to encourage posts on marriage and family; and a plan for November-January to encourage posts on Mercy, especially the corporal and spiritual works of mercy.

Bringing social media users together would encourage collaboration. Everyone is more likely to like, comment on positively, re-tweet or share the work of someone they know rather than the work of a stranger. The more that happens, the higher ranking the social media algorithms will give that content, enabling it to reach a wider (and therefore more unchurched) audience.

Coming together also enables the sharing of technological information, 'tricks of the trade', decreasing common mistakes made and increasing efficiency.

Most social media content creators will welcome topic suggestions, and will definitely welcome resources. One of the major reasons bloggers stop blogging is that they run out of ideas to write about.

The other big reason bloggers stop blogging is that it is a huge time commitment for very little reward and almost non-existent feedback.

A once a month commitment to post something related to the diocesan topic is reasonable, and shouldn't overwhelm the raison d'etre for the blog/ twitter feed etc.

Good resources to provide your social media evangelists would be copies of 'One Body Many Blogs' http://www.amazon.com.au/One-Body-Many-Blogs-Burdick-ebook/dp/B009LBZI1K, 'Tweet others as you would wish to be tweeted' https://catholic.org.au/world-communications-day-2015/tweet-others-as-you-would-be-tweeted , copies of 'Familiaris Consortio' and 'Dives in Misericordia', 'Love and Responsibility' http://www.ignatius.com/Products/LRE-P/love-and-responsibility.aspx and any good material on Theology of the Body.

Good resources would also include access to diocesan image banks for images upon which copyright has already been paid, and information on effective ways of producing memes to go with the text on social media channels. Attaching a relevant image to a social media post significantly increases the number of clicks that post receives.

Plan – Step 1 Find your front line troops
Should you have convinced your bishop that a social media 'army' is what he desperately needs....Using social media and print media (email, Facebook, Twitter, website, diocesan newsletter etc) get the word out that the bishop wants to connect with his social media apostles. Criteria should be used similar to that used for submissions to Top Catholic Blogs http://topcatholicblogs.com/submit-blog/ would be appropriate, for example evidence of using a social media channel regularly for over six months, with a minimum monthly posting, content must be Catholic in nature and in line with Church teaching, the social media channel contains links to official Catholic content, eg www.vatican.va/en www.catholic.org.au

Plan – Step 2 Get them together
A Saturday at the diocesan offices would be best, to enable the maximum number of social media apostles to attend. On Saturdays workers are usually at leisure and mums can find someone to look after the children. Start the day properly with Mass, after registrations, a welcome and a vision for diocesan social media will be presented. First session is on using social media to evangelise. Second session is an overview of how various social media channels work, with a maximum 10 minutes per channel (just because you are proficient in one of them doesn't mean that you know how the others work or what the possibilities are). Third session is where your social media apostles each get 2-3 minutes to introduce themselves and their blog/twitter handle/facebook page etc and what they are trying to achieve with it. Some will be more focused on apologetics, others more focused on theology, bible study, vocations or family life. Fourth session is where people get split up into groups based on social media channel, (bloggers and tweeters, Facebook users, Pinterest and Instagram, Podcasts and YouTube) and learn from each other. Fifth session is re-presentation of diocesan vision, distribution of free resources, blessing and commissioning. NB Only get people who are actually proficient in evangelising through the various social media channels to lead sessions, and make attendance free.

Plan – Step 3 Do it again regularly
Aim for four times a year, and make sure you achieve three times a year. Subsequent Social Media Days should have opportunities for feedback at diocesan level and individual level about how things are going (statistics, reach, followers, comments, troll management etc)

Why bother?
Because currently very little diocesan content is being liked and shared. That needs to change.
Because in the culture wars of all the 'isms' and political moves to undermine the Judeo-Christian foundations upon which society rests, a united and co-ordinated response is needed. And it needs to be built now. When the government announces the next bit of anti-life legislation will be far too late. If you have no social media troops, then what you say as a bishop has no hope of trending on social media. If you have 50 social media apostles, you have a fighting chance. And troops take time to build, and time to establish online credibility. It takes perseverance, vision, dedication and real support.

Our Lady, Help of Christians, pray for us
St Paul the Apostle, pray for us
Blessed James Alberione, pray for us

Appendix
Getting people onto Facebook is best done at the parish level by proficient parishioners. It can start with a gathering of parishioners for an introductory session to Facebook, what it looks like, how it works, privacy considerations, good pages for Catholic content, and how to use Facebook for soft evangelisation of family members. An achievable aim is three likes and one share of holy content per week. That's enough to be interesting but not overwhelming for unchurched friends and family. After the session parishioners would be invited to sign up for a one-on-one tutorial with a proficient parishioner. That tutorial will take place in the parishioner's own home and on his/her own devices, and is likely to be of two hours duration in order to go through all the set up profile and privacy procedures. It will also give time for the parishioners to get to know each other better. Inevitably new Facebook users will get stuck, confused and puzzled, so having a proficient parishioner who can easily stop by for 5 minutes and help them out on that learning curve is essential. NB. The introductory session needs to be conducted by proficient parishioners so that the other parishioners begin to trust their knowledge.

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This page has proved so continuously popular that it seemed like a good idea to update it, and add some further thoughts.
​You can read it here. 

​In every parish there is great concern for the young people, and lots of desire to help them, but not much in the way of ideas that seem to work.
 
Our parish doesn't even have a youth group at present, although there is talk of starting it up again in July – presumably after World Youth Day Krakow and mid-year university exams.
 
A wiser move might be to start sooner and have something with a bit of momentum for youngsters to join when they return. Joining a winning team is a lot more attractive than the heavy work of building a team that might be a winner months and years down the track.
 
The previous youth group met fortnightly, following the 6pm Sunday night Mass, and was largely invisible to the parish present at the other weekend Masses unless there was a fund raising event going on for World Youth Day pilgrims.
 
To find out about the youth group you had to ring a mobile phone number. For me that's a bit of a barrier because I'd like to see salient details in the parish bulletin, on a parish notice board and on the parish website before I picked up the phone, but perhaps the ease with which text messages are sent these days works in favour of this method with young people.
 
Having fortnightly meetings raises red flags for me too. I know just how cross I would be if I went to the effort of showing up and found nothing was on because I chose the wrong week. Fortnightly meetings also cause me to question the commitment of the leaders. While the average youngster will show up without any regularity, there needs to always be someone there to catch them if they do show up. Weekly is best, but if that's not practical then monthly is easier to remember.
 
At our other weekend Masses we have welcomers who hand out parish bulletins and greet people as they come in. Strangely that doesn't seem to happen at our 6pm Sunday Mass which gets the youngest demographic of all 4 weekend Masses. Sometimes there aren't any parish bulletins left, I get that, but what a golden opportunity is being missed for the young people to act as welcomers and to be able to gradually get to know the others who come to that Mass by name and to be able to say, 'We've got …. on at the youth group tonight after Mass, would you like to join us?'
 
My memories of youth groups past (in decades of yore) were ambivalent at best. I normally came home more frustrated with the lack of organization and planning than uplifted and spiritually nourished. Rumours exist that from the bishop down, there is a desire that youth groups have more real religious content than social activity. What should this content be? If I were a youngster again, what would have the pulling power to get me out of my comfort zone and off to a youth group (other than the hope of meeting someone attractive of the opposite gender)?
 
Two ideas might be worth exploring. One's a moldy oldie and the other is new.
 
Back in the 1930s parishes had debating societies. Whether something as formal as that is needed, I don't know. But picking a topic the previous week and getting everyone to prepare 'for' and 'against' arguments, would get youngsters thinking through both sides of an issue. On the day, each person present would pick 'for' or 'against' out of a hat, and then deliver 2 minutes of speech for that side of the case. Relevant topics could be 'Are Internships good for you?', 'Does my vote matter?', 'Is suffering worthwhile?', 'Dating vs Courtship', 'What is better: being spiritual or being religious?'.
 
An important component of being a young person is making big decisions like what to study, where to study, and what kind of work am I suited to? Current data says that the average young person is taking 8 years to get full time work, even if they have qualifications. That's a lot of worry and uncertainty for anyone to deal with. I suspect that if we don't tackle the jobs/unemployment situation with our young people then we are failing them. Even if someone is already in tertiary education, eg law, they still need to work out what kind of law practice they are best suited to, for example size of firm, content of practice (criminal, environmental, family, business). That's why I am thinking working week by week through the exercises in the Teen edition of the job seeking book 'What Colour is my Parachute? might be an answer. Every exercise increases self- knowledge, and helps to discover God given talents and personal preferences, increasing the chances of discovering God's perfect will for each participant. With prayers to begin and end, and time to share the ups and downs of the journey, it might be a winner. Wouldn't it be wonderful to see the personal discoveries and friendships formed bear fruit in successful new business enterprises that bring honour to God and livelihoods and hope to others?
 
But how do you actually get them in? Putting up a poster or adding a paragraph to the parish bulletin is not going to work. Think about what it takes for you to go to a meeting where you are sure you will know nobody? It is even tougher when you are a young person. Remember, the majority of the young people in our parishes don't even know each other. That means you need to have ice-breaker events and plenty of personal 'face to face' invitations.
 
What kind of ice-breaker event would get you to attend?
 
My ideal ice-breaker event would be on a Saturday night, straight after vigil Mass, in the parish hall. A little bit of fundraising could be done with a sausage sizzle, drinks and a raffle. Entry cost would be a nominal amount like $5 unless you were bringing someone aged 13-30 with you, in which case you would both get in free. Call it a 'Music and Dance' night, and have a selection of music from the 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s, with lots music that waltzes and foxtrots could be danced to. For a playlist would need to include a bit of Glen Miller, Elvis, Beatles, Moon River, Unchained Melody, Puttin' on the Ritz, and other much loved 'dance-able' hits. The idea is that people could come to dance if they wished, or just sit and tap and sway to the music if they wished. Hopefully the youngsters would see some of their oldsters shine on the dance floor, and have a bit of fun in the process. At half time there would be an announcement about the plans to re-launch the youth group. The aim is to tell people about the small ice-breaker events that have been planned for the youngsters. Those in the youth group leadership team would then work the room for the rest of the evening, getting to know people and talking in more detail about their vision for the youth group. Definitely no alcohol would be permitted, because it just causes trouble. You would need a First Aid person on hand just in case someone hurt themselves in a fall.
 
In the meantime let us pray for our young people and for those called to minister to them.
 
St John Bosco, pray for us.
St Mary Mazzarello, pray for us.
Our Lady, Help of Christians, pray for us

The great feast of Pentecost is days away, and at our study group today we spent some time meditating on Mark 16:14-20 using a simple lectio divina method.

That passage mentions the gift of tongues as a sign associated with believers in Jesus. 

So what is the gift of tongues?
 
Our starting point must be that every gift that comes from God is good and has a good purpose and is worth having and asking for.
 
Usually for each Sunday Mass there are two options for the Opening Prayer (sometimes known as the Collect), - a short one and a longer one - and I am saddened that with the new translation of the liturgy we seem to have lost one of the most beautiful Opening Prayers for Pentecost ever. Only one option is provided in my new Missal.
 
Here's what we used to have an option to use:
 
'Father of Light, from Whom every good gift comes, send Your Spirit into our lives with the power of a mighty wind, and by the flame of Your wisdom open the horizons of our minds. Loosen our tongues to sing Your praise in words beyond the power of speech, for without Your Spirit man could never raise his voice in words of peace or announce the truth that Jesus is Lord, Who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.'
 
So this is the prayer the Church Herself has prayed, at least since Vatican II and probably many centuries before, asking God to send His Holy Spirit and to give His gift of tongues.
 
If holy mother Church takes seriously the injunction of St Paul to 'be ambitious for the higher gifts' 1 Cor 12:31 and 'by all means be ambitious to prophesy, do not suppress the gift of tongues' 1 Cor 14:39, then we should too.
 
The gift of tongues was widespread in New Testament times, and is widespread in our times as well. In fact, a careful study of the lives of the Saints will show that this gift has always been present in the Church. A long time back I read a little book that had done this research, and I recall several quotations from St Teresa of Avila being part of it. The term the Church uses is ‘glossalia’, and plugging that term into a search engine may help you whenever you do your own studies.
 
So what exactly are we praying and asking for? I will deal with the more ordinary gift of tongues first, and the less ordinary gift of interpretation later.
 
The gift of tongues is the only one of the so-called ‘extraordinary charisms’ of the Holy Spirit to be under the control of the person. All of the others only happen when the Holy Spirit wills it. This gift appears to be a gateway to all of the other charismatic gifts. This is possibly because it requires a person to trust God enough to risk looking a little foolish, and this is a necessary training ground for the other gifts.
 
The gift of tongues does not usually come with any ‘spiritual feelings’ attached. It feels exactly similar to speaking any language other than your mother tongue. And we all feel minor embarrassment when speaking in a foreign language in front of someone else.
 
The gift of tongues produces a similar effect to saying the rosary. Most people have had the experience of saying the rosary and getting lost in thought or meditation and your saying of the words becomes almost background noise because you are not paying attention to the words. The gift of tongues ‘feels’ like that. It replaces the usual soul/heart-mind-God prayer process with a soul/heart-God process, bypassing the mental formation of words.
 
For those of us who intellectually believe in God, but find that our hearts haven't caught up or are not quite so sure, this is an important gift for getting that  ‘I believe’ down from the mind to the heart. It is a gift that lets the heart - through the Holy Spirit - speak to God.
 
Most of the time when the gift of tongues is in use, we have no idea what we are babbling about to God; but we know that God knows. When that happens Romans 8:26-27 starts making perfect sense: 'The Spirit too comes to help us in our weakness. For when we cannot choose words in order to pray properly, the Spirit Himself expresses our plea in a way that could never be put into words, and God Who knows everything in our hearts knows perfectly well what He means, and that the pleas of the saints expressed by the Spirit are according to the mind of God.'
 
The hardest part of receiving the gift is the initial surrender of letting God be God and being willing to look and sound a bit foolish for His sake. It is a gift that God never forces upon anyone. True, sometimes it is given spontaneously by Him at moments of great joy or intense sorrow, but normally we have to specifically ask for it and then wait for His perfect timing to receive it.  
 
This gift teaches us that it is truly God who prays in us, as the scriptures tell us He does. It is also a gift that brings unity and harmony when people pray in this gift together to God.
 
The gift of tongues is like the plug that goes into an electric socket. It plugs us into the sources of God’s power through prayer. All prayer does this, but praying in tongues appears to have a particular efficacy.
 
The gift of interpretation of tongues is a far less ordinary gift, due in big part to the large degree of trust a person has to have in God for God to be able to use them. The trust is needed on the part of the person God calls to speak out loud in a tongue. It is a gift only given when a group prays together. The members of the prayer group are alerted by this first charism that the good Lord has some rather important message to give. The prayer group then prays for an interpretation, and waits. The praying opens hearts further to listen and receive the message. Usually more than one person receives an interpretation and they confirm the message.
 
There is also a lesser manifestation of this gift when a passage of scripture is being read out loud, and you hear an inner voice from God giving a particular line by line application of that scripture to your life or to a specific situation.
 
Because God is God, He is not limited by our preferred ways of doing things. Talking donkeys, burning bushes and being asked to go to Straight Street to meet a determined persecutor etc, are all unusual things God has done in the past. We might think speaking in tongues falls into this category, however there is ample evidence in the New Testament that the Apostles and other early Christians saw speaking in tongues as a gift from God to those who accepted Jesus as Saviour and were baptized. It is a worthwhile project to find a concordance (online or book) and to look up all of the scripture references to speaking in tongues.
 
Let's pray:
 
Dear God, that You have strange gifts to give like this gift of tongues puzzles me. I don't usually associate weird stuff with You. I don't understand it. It even frightens me a bit. But I know that You are good, and so many times You have shown me how faithful and trustworthy You are. So I am willing to trust You in this matter. If You want to give me this gift of tongues, then I am willing to receive it at the time and place of Your choosing. Even now, if that is Your good pleasure and holy will for me. Just please assure me when it does happen that it is definitely from You. Amen 

Holy Apostles of Jesus, pray for us.
Holy Disciples baptized on that first Pentecost day by the Apostles, pray for us.
St Teresa of Avila and all Saints who experienced this gift, pray for us.

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For anyone wanting a deeper level of understanding, and access to research on this topic, here are two recommended books:
They Speak With Other Tongues by John Sherrill is a classic because it is written from the point of view of a skeptical journalist gathering evidence.
As By A New Pentecost by Patti Gallagher Mansfield tells the story of the beginning of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal and its links to Pope Leo XIII and the Pentecostal movement.