Praying in the era of Facebook

The union of two acts of the spirit, so different from each other and so separated from time, is very meaningful, thanks to Facebook’s technology: on one hand the very ancient use of the prayer, which goes back in time until man’s origin; and on the other hand the use of one of the most recent and most refined instruments of human technology: digital communication, also called “online”.

In the prayer the spirit goes inside itself, in its own unfathomable interiority, and sets in front of God present in the conscience, in the silence and in solitude; in the telematic message the spirit goes outside and travels at the maximum speed in the space, getting in contact with a sometimes high number of people: just think of the tweets by the Holy Father.

Meanwhile, in the inner prayer the man is closed in the room of his heart, where God “secretly sees”, in the public prayer the person who is praying, expressing requests, pleas or feelings which touch common interests, shows to all his own intimate dialogue with God, and so all can join to the words by the person who is praying, when he launches his message.

For sure mankind since the most ancient times, most of all through priests, prophets, seers, spiritual guide and rites’ ministers, including also political and military leaders, used the instruments of the time to express a public prayer, which is a religious act of great value, because it is the expression of a deep social cohesion and solidarity based on the common divine recourse and so on the perception that the union of souls in the common pursuit of life’s values depends on divinity.

The instrument of Facebook, together with others, so economic, of immediate instantaneous world global reach, so easily usable and accessible from for everybody as never before in communications’ technology’s history, allows to the prayer to be more than before an expression of the soul of each of us, as simple human beings, beyond age, culture, social condition and religion differences, and so allows, more than past technical means, to facilitate and to spread that cult for God, which is the highest expression of the human soul and powerful principle of peace, justice and harmony among peoples.

(Translation by Marina Madeddu)