A social media Reformation?

As every avid Twitter user knows, there are only 140 characters in a "tweet" and that includes the empty spaces. The bishops gathered at the ancient Council of Nicea didn't face that kind of communications challenge and, thus, produced an old-fashioned creed that in English is at least 1,161 characters long.

No wonder so many of the gray-haired administrators in black suits in the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops struggle with life online. It's hard to take seriously the frivolous-sounding words – "blog" and "tweet" leap to mind – that define reality among the natives on what Pope Benedict XVI calls the "Digital Continent."

"In the past, the church would often build new parish structures, knowing that people would recognize the church architecture and start showing up. On the Digital Continent, 'If you build it, they will come' does not hold true," said Bishop Ronald Herzog of Alexandria, La., in a report from the body's communications committee.

"We digital immigrants need lessons on the digital culture, just as we expect missionaries to learn the cultures of the people they are evangelizing. We have to be enculturated. It's more than just learning how to create a Facebook account."

This is important news in an era in which recent research from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life found that the Catholic Church was retaining 68 percent of its members who, as children, were raised in the fold. While the church is making converts, those who have left Catholicism in recent years outnumber those who have joined by nearly a 4-to-1 ratio.

Almost half of those who left Catholicism and did not join another church exited before the age of 18, as did one-third of those who chose to join another church. Another 30 percent of young Catholics left the church by the age of 24. At that point, the departure rate slowed down.

Truth is, it is almost impossible to talk about the lives of teens and young adults without discussion the growing power of their social-media networks. For young people worldwide, social media and their mobile devices have become the "first point of reference" in daily life, warned Herzog.

"The implications of that for a church which is struggling to get those same young people to enter our churches on Sunday are staggering. If the church is not on their mobile device, it doesn't exist."

As recently as a similar report in 2007, it was clear the bishops were hesitant to discuss the digital world because they feared its power when used by the church's critics, said Rocco Palmo, who produces the influential "Whispers in the Loggia" weblog about Catholic news and trends.

The Herzog report was a step forward, primarily because the bishops seem to realize this is a subject that they cannot ignore. That's significant in an era in which many Vatican officials still cling to their fax machines and struggle to keep up with their email. During the recent Baltimore meetings, said Palmo, there were more iPads in the hands of younger bishops "than you would find at your local Apple store."

"In the old days, that stone church on the corner was a sign of the presence of God in your community. Well, that's what a church website is today," he said. If bishops and priests cannot grasp "that one-dimensional reality in our culture, how are they supposed to grasp the two-dimensional, interactive world of social media?"

The theoretical stakes are high, noted Herzog, but it has also become impossible to ignore the raw numbers. For example, if the 500 million active Facebook users became their own nation, it would be the world's third largest – behind China and India.

The bottom line: Catholicism may be "facing as great a challenge as that of the Protestant Reformation," said the bishop.

"Anyone can create a blog. Everyone's opinion is valid. And if a question or contradiction is posted, the digital natives expect a response and something resembling a conversation," said Herzog. "We can choose not to enter into that cultural mindset, but we do so at great peril to the Church's credibility and approachability in the minds of the natives. ...

"This is a new form of pastoral ministry. It may not be the platform we were seeking, but it is an opportunity of such magnitude that we should consider carefully the consequences of disregarding it."

John Lennon, 'spiritual,' not 'religious'

Few images of John Lennon are as iconic as that of the ex-Beatle playing a white piano in a white room, gazing into the camera lens while singing "Imagine." "Imagine there's no heaven. It's easy if you try. No hell below us, above us only sky. Imagine all the people, living for today," said Lennon, in the anthem that for many defined his life. "Imagine there's no countries. It isn't hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too."

Critics of the rock martyr have quoted these words almost as often as his admirers, especially in light of another quotation about religion that haunted the enigmatic superstar. In a 1966 interview about life in England, Lennon stated: "Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that. I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now."

Months later, his words were published in America. Many churches responded with bonfires of Beatles records and some Bible Belt radio stations banned the group's music – for a while. Lennon received death threats.

Responding to the firestorm, Lennon told American reporters: "I pointed out that fact in reference to England, that we meant more to kids than Jesus did. ... I was just saying it as a fact and it's true more for England than here."

Decades later, pop-culture scholars and religious leaders continue to argue about what Lennon believed and when he believed it. This is the kind of topic that is being discussed in England, America and elsewhere during the fall of 2010 – when Lennon would have been 70 years old.

Despite the images in "Imagine," Lennon "certainly wasn't an atheist, he was clear about that," noted Father Robert Hart, an Anglican traditionalist from Chapel Hill, N.C., whose "Hard to Imagine" essay was recently published in the journal Touchstone.

"What he was missing in his life was the certainty of a specific, definitive revelation of a particular religious truth. It's not that he denied that this kind of truth existed, but he was never able to find it. That's what he lacked and he knew it."

In other words, he was a vivid example of an attitude toward faith that has only gained power in the decades since his death. Lennon was "spiritual," but not "religious" before that stance became all too common.

And what about his statement that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus?

"The real problem with what John Lennon said in 1966 is not what so many were quick to assume and to decry in a knee-jerk reaction," noted Hart, in his essay. "The real problem is the element of truth in what he said. The Beatles WERE more popular than the Lord himself among youth in England at the time, as was Frank Sinatra among the older set in America – and as are television, video games and many other things of this world to very many people today.

"Lennon, the eccentric artist, poet and musician, spoke all too accurately."

Lennon's life was defined by symbolic moments, noted Hart. He was – literally – born during an air raid and died after being gunned down by a mad man. As a teen, the vicar of the Liverpool parish in which Lennon was baptized and confirmed banned him from services for laughing at an inopportune time, almost certainly during a sermon.

As a global superstar, Lennon pushed his art and psyche to the limit while trying drugs, Eastern mysticism, psychics, astrologers and other ways of coping with life and his fear of death. As an adult he exchanged letters full of spiritual questions with televangelist Oral Roberts, at one point writing, "Explain to me what Christianity can do for me. Is it phony? Can He love me? I want out of hell."

For a brief time, Lennon tried to embrace evangelical Christianity. In the end, he called himself a "Zen Christian," among other labels.

One would have to conclude, Hart said, that Lennon both reflected his times and influenced them. He did his searching right out in the open.

"This was a man who, if anything, was almost too honest about his doubts and his beliefs," said Hart. "There are people who keep things bottled up inside. Well, that wasn't John Lennon. The question is whether anyone really listened to what he was trying to say."

Rome ponders iMissal app

When it comes to liturgical details, the Vatican has clear guidelines about sacred objects that are blessed for use during a Mass. "The Church has always sought," notes the Book of Blessings, "to ensure that all those things that are involved in any way in divine worship should be worthy, becoming and beautiful. ... Those objects that through a blessing are set aside for divine worship are to be treated with reverence by all and to be put only to their proper use, never profaned."

This includes books on the altar, as noted in the 2001 text Liturgiam authenticam (The Authentic Liturgy): "The books from which the liturgical texts are recited in the vernacular with or on behalf of the people should be marked by such a dignity that the exterior appearance of the book itself will lead the faithful to a greater reverence for the word of God and for sacred realities."

But the question some Catholics are asking these days is this: Can there be an app for that? What if clergy used iPads containing the Roman Missal?

At this point, the hierarchy has not publicly approved this leap, noted Father John J.M. Foster, who teaches liturgical law at the Catholic University of America. But that doesn't mean that the Vatican might not support the limited use of an iPad application, which recently was created by an Italian priest who is a consultant with the Pontifical Council for Social Communications.

Nevertheless, it's hard to imagine priests walking in processions with iPads lifted high. Could that happen?

"Not yet," said Foster. "That doesn't mean that some parish somewhere isn't going to make PDF copies of the Gospels, put them on an iPad and hand them to the deacon. ... However, we shouldn't assume that something can be used in the liturgy, simply because it has not been forbidden."

This buzz began in June, when Father Paolo Padrini said he was releasing an app offering the Roman Missal – the texts that are read and sung during Masses throughout the year – in Latin, English, Italian, French and Spanish. Two years earlier, he created an iBreviary for the iPhone, containing the Catholic book of daily prayers.

The Catholic blogosphere reacted immediately. Certainly in iMissal would help priests, such as military chaplains, who were constantly on the move. Priests with weak eyesight could change font sizes in a few seconds. But what would happen if the app crashed during Mass? Could laypeople read along, or would they be tempted to check their email?

The church, however, has faced technical questions before. Hand-written volumes gave way to those printed on presses. However, priests cannot hear confessions by telephone. Internet confessions don't work, either.

Speaking as a "self-professed geek who is a lover of both technology and theology," Jeff Miller of the Curt Jester website confessed that he has mixed emotions about liturgical texts on mobile devices.

"This might be a question answered by the Vatican sometime in the future, though they are notoriously slow in answering questions of this type," wrote Miller. "I can certainly see why some priests would appreciate an electronic version of the Roman Missal. It would be much harder to loose your place and in fact easier to find the correct section each day. I love electronic versions of the Liturgy of the Hours because it makes it so easy to read ... without having to thumb through a bunch of ribboned bookmarks."

Some changes will be needed, stressed Jeff Geerling of Open Source Catholic. For example, the screens on these devices will need to operate without strong backlighting. Imagine the blue-glow distraction of iPads during candlelight services. And that omnipresent aluminum shell?

"An appropriate case," he noted, "would need to be manufactured to (a) mask the logo on the back, and (b) downplay the fact that a bit of electronic technology is being used. Something simple; perhaps a nice red leather case?"

At this point, noted Foster, no one knows how these apps will evolve. One thing is certain. Priests would need to look up prayers for special occasions and rites.

"There would still be work to do," he said. "That's why we have all those ribbons. It's not like you could just call up a day of the year and everything would be right there so that you could keep scrolling on and on and on. It's not that simple."

Congregating with Jon Stewart Leibowitz

In the beginning, there was the multimedia superstar Glenn Beck summoning his Tea Party congregation to a faith-friendly "Restoring Honor" rally on the National Mall. And behold, two postmodern prophets witnessed this media storm and decided that it was good. In response, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert of Comedy Central organized their pre-election "Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear."

Colbert, a progressive Catholic Sunday school teacher who pretends to be a right-wing blowhard, provided the fake "fear" factor. In his upside-down catechism, preaching "fear" became the same thing as advocating that nonpartisan virtue – "hope."

The prophet of sanity was Jon Stewart. With his snarky call for rationality and civility, the Daily Show anchor implied that his critics were preaching insanity, irrationality and incivility. And, for once, he didn't season his satire with ironic shots at his own Jewish roots.

Truth is, Stewart has become a hero for many Jews and a controversial figure for others, noted Jane Eisner, editor of The Jewish Daily Forward. Nevertheless, Stewart – originally Jon Stewart Leibowitz – has once again been named to the "Forward 50," the newspaper's list of those who made a "significant impact on the Jewish story in the past year."

"This is very impressionistic," she said. "We try to identify people who are acting in ways that impact the Jewish community. ... We are looking for people who are acting in ways that really show the impact of their Jewish values, whether we're talking about Judaism as a faith or a culture."

However, many Jews have "real questions about how Jewishly Stewart acts." Nevertheless, said Eisner, "if we can translate this into Jewish terms, he keeps showing us that he knows his stuff, even as he makes fun of the fine details of Jewish life."

As his Forward 50 mini-biography notes: "A Democrat in the White House has hardly tempered the irreverent and distinctly Jewish voice of the liberal-leaning fake news anchor. ... Stewart is quick to play the Jewish card, drop a Zabar’s reference or cozy up to bubbes and zaydes at the 92nd Street Y."

That's one side of this identity question. However, the Hollywood Jew weblog noted: "For some Jews it's perplexing that Jon Stewart, an American Jewish icon, isn't religious. How could the Jew who makes Jewish 'cool' be so indifferent to Judaism? ... Buried beneath the laughter from his jokes ... is a deep and hidden disappointment that he isn't really doing what we're doing." This is, after all, a man who flaunts his bacon-cheeseburgers on Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar.

Nevertheless, with his edgy sermons about skepticism and reason, Stewart dwells comfortably with other Jewish progressives who see themselves as heirs of the Enlightenment – standing against blind faith and ancient traditions. The assumption for many on the Jewish left, said Eisner, is that there is always "something worrisome about people who take their faith really seriously."

These religious tensions were visible on the National Mall during the Stewart-Colbert rally. While organizers insisted their event was non-partisan, and pled with participants to temper their words and deeds, the crowd included flocks of people who clearly were there to mock the views of religious and secular conservatives.

Consider, for example, the inevitable Hitler signs.

When announcing his rally, Stewart said he planned to distribute signs that were both civil and witty. One sign, for example, would say: "I Disagree With You, But I'm Pretty Sure You're Not Hitler."

Many got the message, but some didn't. Someone produced signs containing images of prominent conservatives – with Hitler mustaches – and the headline, "Afraid yet?" Beck, Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh made the sign, along with Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, almost certainly the next Speaker of the House, and Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia, the likely House majority leader.

Cantor is Jewish and, like Stewart, made the Forward 50 list for 2010.

Stewart remained silent. Still, as his rally ended, the funny man soberly admitted that he could not control "what people think this was."

"I can only tell you my intentions," he said. "This was not a rally to ridicule people of faith, or people of activism, or to look down our noses at the heartland, or passionate argument, or to suggest that times are not difficult, and that we have nothing to fear. They are, and we do.

"But we live now in hard times – not the end times."

Politics, Baylor, The NoZe & Aqua Buddha

If Texas Baptists had a patron saint, the Rev. George W. Truett would almost certainly get the nod. So it was a solemn occasion when the great preacher from Dallas arrived in "Jerusalem on the Brazos" in 1941 to preach a series of revival services at Baylor University, the planet's largest Baptist institution of higher learning. Then loud alarm clocks started ringing in the attic of cavernous Waco Hall, on three-minute intervals.

This pandemonium was, of course, orchestrated by Baylor's Nose Brotherhood. This club for satirists was born in 1926 and quickly became known for its "Pink Tea" spectaculars, which offered "vertical exercising" on a campus that, from 1845-1996, banned dancing. The secret society was "just a fun-loving bunch of boys," Brother Dude Nose Harrison told the Dallas Morning News in 1931.

The Nose became the NoZe in 1965 when, in an event that has achieved mythic status, a campus bridge that once a year was ceremonially painted pink mysteriously went up in flames. The brothers were temporarily banished, but began appearing in their signature glasses, fake noses and tacky wigs.

The question now facing America is whether the activities of the NoZe Brotherhood could cost the Republican Party control of the U.S. Senate.

Alas, this is not satire.

Kentucky Democrat Jack Conway has asked why Republican Rand Paul, in the ominous words of a television advertisement, was a "member of a secret society that called the Holy Bible a 'hoax,' that was banned for mocking Christianity and Christ? Why did Rand Paul once tie a woman up, tell her to bow down before a false idol and say his god was 'Aqua Buddha'?"

Being accused of "anti-Christian" activities is not a good thing in the Bible Belt. As the Washington Post put it, Paul stands accused of participating in a "secret society while at Baylor University that published mocking statements regarding the Bible."

The Conway campaign added: "This is an ad about things he did. He has failed to deny any of these charges."

At this point, I should stress that while I am a Baylor graduate from the same era as Paul, I am not, nor have I ever been, a member of the NoZe Brotherhood. I did know some NoZe folks, including one who became a White House speechwriter, and like all Baylor alumni I know that no non-NoZe knows the no-nonsense non-NoZe news that the NoZe knows.

The Republican has acknowledged participating in NoZe pranks. Meanwhile, one of his Baylor colleagues told the Louisville Courier-Journal: "We aspired to blasphemy and he flourished in it."

Sounds like the NoZe to me.

During my years at Baylor, the secret society mocked all kinds of people, including Dan Rather, Richard Nixon, Watergate special prosecutor Leon Jaworski (a powerful Baylor alum) and Bob Woodward of the Washington Post. I was present when Woodward was made an honorary member – Brother Water NoZe, or some variation on that theme. As I recall, the NoZe crashed his campus lecture, presenting him with his own plunger, while seated on a rolling commode.

The NoZe mocked all things Baptist, targeting the many sacred cows that resided on campus. These NoZe drippings rarely achieved brilliance and often veered into college-life stupidity.

Nevertheless, the Baylor Library maintains a modest NoZe archive. While the brotherhood has been exiled from campus several times, its official historian – the late Brother Short Nose (William B.) Long – served on the Baylor board of regents and received his alma mater's highest honor, The Founders Medal.

Drawing on this respected physician's book, "The Nose Brotherhood Knows: A Collection of Nothings and Non-Happenings, 1926-1965," Baylor Magazine published a 2003 report that probed the philosophy behind the brotherhood's attempts to "put the 'pie' in piety" and "the 'pun' in punctilious."

The bottom line: It is, as a rule, quite dangerous to mix satire and religion.

One of the NoZe – it may have been Brother Bilbo BaggiNoze or Brother IgNoZetius Reilly – told the magazine: "I have no problems whatsoever with Christianity, but I think blind Christianity is a mistake. People are sometimes afraid to examine other religions, but it just makes your beliefs stronger in the end. I don't think a Christian mission means that we can't look at and study everything in the world. Furthermore, if education is really the goal of each student here ... certainly they'd want to be exposed to as many opinions and as many things as possible."