Denver Catholic

22 MAY 12-25, 2018 | DENVER CATHOLIC Perspectives Learning to use social media well M aybe it's just me, but I have this total love/hate rela- tionship with social media. I'll have a week where I spend far too much time on Facebook, reading through discussion threads and even occasion- ally partici- pating. But then I'll get so fed up with myself for having invested (read: wasted) so much time there, that I completely disengage for w eeks on end after- wards. I guess you could call it a bit of a Facebook hangover. In general, I try to avoid interact- ing on social media. Lately it seems like an increasingly angry place, par- ticularly when it comes to cultural, social, and political issues. Gone are the days of cute baby pictures and grumpy cat memes. But I also know that as Catholics, we don't have the luxury of disengaging fully. It is our moral duty to pursue, promote, and extoll the common good. The Catho- lic faith is not a privatized, individual- istic means of working out our salva- tion, it turns out, but a faith lived and experienced in community. We come to receive the Eucharist in the Holy Mass together, after all. But how do we engage on Facebook (or other platforms) in an era of such confusion and polarization, without completely losing our minds? And, is it even worth it? It's important, I think, to recognize both the limitations and infl uence of social media. On the one hand, plat- forms like Facebook and Instagram remain very poor substitutes for face-to-face, authentic engagement with another person. They o› er a level of anonymity that allows for behavior that most people would probably be ashamed to exhibit in person. Worse yet, it is in one sense a form of make-believe — none of your interactions are actually happening in the real world. People would do well to take the time they're spending on social media and invest it into their parish community or neighborhood. But all of that being said, we can't deny that the digital continent wields a tremendous amount of reach and potential infl uence. Before my con- version to Catholicism, I didn't know any Catholics in real life. The only information I had was in books and online. So, I came to really appreciate the small handful of Catholics with a strong web presence, who made the tenets of the faith accessible to me when I didn't yet have a parish community of my own. Therefore, it makes sense for Catholics (who wish to do so) to live their faith publicly, online, and thus engage the larger culture. It should certainly not sup- plant in-real-life evangelization and community, but it can be an addition (or, as in my case, a precursor) to it. You never know who is watching and listening in to your discussion about the sanctity of life. You don't know who is admiring your Catholic life- style. God does the real work here, of course, but we can certainly help plant the seeds. And really, who better to confront the problems facing our culture than the very Bride of Christ? There is an enormous need for Catholics on the frontlines, upholding the dignity of the human person, demonstrating what the love of Jesus looks like, and doing the long, hard work of the Gospel. We live in a throw-away cul- ture where now even people, created in the image and likeness of Christ, have become expendable. Yet as Catholics, we possess the truth about the dignity of the human person, and therefore are able to have our respec- tive communities' best interests at heart, even when it comes to shap- ing public policy. We are incredibly blessed to have the social teaching of the Church, marked by things like subsidiarity and a preferential option for the poor (participation in Freedom is never free W hen I fi rst visited Lviv, the principal city of western Ukraine, in 2002, the transportation from plane to airport terminal was an old bus towed by a Soviet-era tractor; today, the airport is a model of cleanliness and e - ciency. In 2002, the Old Town was shabby and begrimed; today, it's become a major tourist destination, and while there is still more clean-up to do, the charms of an old Habsburg city are beginning to reveal themselves. To sit in a d owntown restaurant and speak with the city's mayor about his plans for further development, it's easy to forget that you're in a country at war. But then you come to the Garrison Church of Sts. Peter and Paul. There, Father Stepan Sus of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church is running an urban ministry so dynamic that he has twenty other priests working with him. The church itself is full of architectural and decorative interest: built in the Baroque style in the early seven- teenth century as the city's "Jesuit Church" (and therefore modeled on the Church of the Gesù in Rome), Sts. Peter and Paul long served as a center of military chaplaincy for the Austrian and Polish troops garrisoned in Lviv. Then, in 1946, the property was seized by the Soviet regime and the church was turned into a book depository in which some two million volumes were stored. After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 and Ukraine achieved independence, there was a fuss over ownership, and it was not until 2010 that the church was deemed the property of the Greek Catholic Archeparchy of Lviv. Father Sus is full of energy, and on both weekdays and Sundays, the church celebrates the Divine Liturgy several times, with confessions avail- able for over 11 hours each day. But when Father Sus takes you to a small memorial to the left of the church's entrance, his mien becomes more sober and you begin to understand that the vibrant ministry underway at this site of ecclesial resurrection has its costs. For there, amidst shell casings, bits of shrapnel, spent bul- lets, and an icon, are the pictures of the young men of the parish who have been killed in the war Russia has been conducting in the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine since 2014. Since the invasion of the Donbass by Russian "little green men," Father Sus has conducted 76 funerals in the garrison church. Each of those young lives, sacrifi ced to defend a country against an aggression the West would prefer to ignore, is a powerful and poignant reminder that freedom is never free. So is the memorial to Bohdan Solchanyk in the foyer of one of the sparkling new buildings that grace the campus of the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv. UKU (as it's known from its initials in transliterated Ukrainian) is another marvel. The only Catholic institution of higher learning in the former Soviet space, UKU was a dream 25 years ago. Today, it's a stun- ning reality — the most highly-rated university in Ukraine on several indi- ces of accomplishment, thanks to the work of an extraordinary faculty and administrative team fi rst assembled by Bishop Borys Gudziak. UKU is a university that takes Catholic mission with utmost seriousness: in this case, the mission to heal and evangelize a society still traumatized by more than seven decades of communism, war, and the Soviet attempt to destroy Ukraine's national identity. The university has long understood that one of its foundations is martyrdom, for the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church was brutally persecuted after World War II and gave the faith thousands of many witnesses-unto-death. When Bohdan Solchanyk, a history lecturer at UKU preparing his doctorate and engaged to be married, went to Kyiv in 2013 to participate in the nonvio- lent demonstrations we now know as the Maidan Revolution of Dignity, he was certainly aware of that founda- tion. Then he, too, became a martyr, shot through the head by a sniper as he peacefully called for a Ukraine cleansed of corruption in society, cul- ture, politics, and economics. The vibrant ministry at Lviv's garrison church and the exceptional university being built at UKU are signs of hope in a world where the bad news sometimes seems to be all the news there is. The war in the Donbass is real, however, and the West needs to take it far more seriously. Guest Column Brianna Heldt is a Catholic writer, speaker and podcaster. Her work has appeared in various print and online publications. BRIANNA HELDT The Catholic DiŒ erence George Weigel is a distinguished senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. GEORGE WEIGEL

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