Catholic Tech Talk

The ashes we’ll wear tomorrow will be an outward sign of penance and contrition. As an outward sign during Lent online, I created a graphic to replace my Facebook and Google+ profile pictures with. I’d love to see other people use this as well—let’s create awareness online and remind ourselves and our Christian brothers and [...]

What kind of people would it be filled with? Would they be kind? In a previous blog post of mine, Dr. Caroline Cerveny, SSJ-TOSF, wrote a comment that resonated with me, “We are in a new day and age where we all need to be good Digital Citizens. We need to be clearer with one [...]

Every time at this time of year I have parents coming at me, late in registering their children for the Sacramental program of First Confession and First Communion. After phone calls and sifting through emails, I needed a break. I ended up watching the highly anticipated Facebook Announcement event via Livestream. It was not much [...]

Unfortunately we live in a society where making fun of Christians, and specifically Catholics, is widely accepted. It’s common to turn on TV or go online just to hear or read some snide remark about Christians. So what do we do? We grow thick skin, we turn the other cheek, and we love them anyway. [...]

The past weekend our diocesan Facebook page came under attack after our bishop wrote about the spiritual implications of voting for intrinsic evil. Some of the posters engaged the substance of the arguments; some, while disrespectful, were at least not vulgar or obscene; and the rest made for the most soul-damaging work of my life. I [...]

One of my favorite Catholic rituals is the candle lighting at the Easter Vigil.  A few years ago I witnessed this event in a somewhat large parish from a balcony.  The whole worship space was pitch black.  In comes the newly lit Pascal Candle down the main aisle.  Candles of those in the pews on [...]

I recently came across an article about Sister Elaine Lachance, Vocation Director for the Good Shepherd Sisters of Quebec, and how she is using social media to spark interest and renew awareness in the religious lifestyle. I instantly loved her story. Growing up I attended weekend camps at a local convent, and as a child [...]

I truly have become a big fan of social networks such as Facebook and Google+ for parishes.  These systems allow for our faith communities to become connected and a part of everyday lives like never before.  One of the things I love about them is event sharing and keeping photos of events for everyone to [...]

It’s been about 9 months since Google+ has launched, and many of us have gotten a good idea of what it’s all about and how it can best  be used.   The biggest misconception I’ve found is the tendency to try and understand the service through a simple “apples to apples” comparison with Facebook.  The [...]

I was recently interviewed by KARE11 (local NBC affiliate) for a story on how churches are using social media to connect with church-goers.

You’ve probably heard about the potential benefits for your parish.  You’ve read about it here.  You’ve heard me say it.  Even some Bishops are tweeting.  The Facebook thing looks great.  Google+ looks interesting.  So you and the Pastor decide to give it a go.  You set up all the accounts, do your customization, you tweet, you [...]

The new Facebook Timeline for Pages has a lot of great benefits for a much richer visitor experience.  One the things I like with the change especially is the more prominent “tabs” display at the top and some really good apps that have been coming out.  For example, as I was recently ramping up our [...]

The other day a friend of mine posted a link to an article where a Pinterest user had come to some point where she felt uncomfortable with using the service and violating copyrights.  The writer was a not only a photographer, but a lawyer.  After reading the article, my friend (who has been an artist [...]

So you’ve taken the time to set up your parish Facebook Page.  You’ve got some “likes” and are posting away.  It’s been fun and exciting, and now you might be wondering what the “pay offs” are and how to actually gauge the performance.  I was thinking this myself the other night.  I’ve been very pleased with [...]

It’s nice to see so many parishes embracing social media and establishing accounts on services like Twitter and building Facebook Pages.  As I look at various parish websites that have staff email addresses posted I have noticed that many are obviously personal addresses (i.e. @Yahoo.com, @Live.com, etc.) I wonder how many parishes have a technology, [...]

Ever since I was a kid I have loved music.  I remember spending hours sifting through and listening to 45′s (yes, I’m that old).  Later on, like many people, I amassed the large number albums, then cassettes, and then CD’s.  There was always a few problems I ran into with these: Storage Finding the music [...]

Over the Christmas holiday, I had the opportunity to go back to my old church, St. Bernard, here in Wauwatosa, WI.  They have a new priest, Father Mike Barrett.  I hadn’t met Father Mike before, but I greatly enjoyed his homily and was struck in how he conducted mass.  His approach to mass got me [...]

The past two weekends my wife and I traveled to visit family.  I’m a fan of traveling, but I’ve never been a fan of packing.  In addition to clothes and toiletries, now we have to be concerned with access to business stuff plus you want stuff to do.  So here’s what we took in addition to our [...]