Social Media with Chinese Catholic Characteristics
When we arrived at Easter Vigil, we immediately sought out one of the the tables where they were distributing the candles. This year, instead of the candles and holders in self-serve boxes, there were some volunteers managing the process, asking Mass-goers to scan a QR code with their phones before they received their candles.
The QR code was for a link to the parish's WeChat subscription account. I was already subscribed, as I was to the Seminary's WeChat service account.
WeChat (in Chinese 微信 Wēixìn), for the uninitiated, is an essential social media app in China. To describe it, many people rely on Western analogs, like Twitter and Facebook, but those don't adequately capture the full functionality of the application. Yes, with Twitter and Facebook inaccessible in China, we rely on WeChat for communicating and information sharing, but it also used much beyond that. It's a wallet, it's a calendar, it's a news site, it's a marketplace---and so many more things that I don't even know about. In addition, everything is organized chronologically, and by account, so in a glance one can distinguish the most recent posts from any subscription.
Service accounts, by the way, displayed as chat messages.
Our parish has both a WeChat subscription account, which is permitted to publish up to once a day, and a service account, which can post about once a week. Between the two, the information normally found in printed parish bulletins can be broadcast. Special events, Holy Week schedules, Faith Formation activities, even news from Vatican Radio are often listed when one of these types of accounts publishes an update.
Sometimes there will be entries with photos of a recent Mass or meeting.
Beyond the kinds of information that could distributed on paper, we also receive multi-media posts. Sometimes we receive a recording and a transcript of that Sunday's homily. These have been excellent for me to test how we we understood or did not understand what the priest was saying. Myles likes to look at it, too, if only to see how long the homily was.
Often, the text and music for the following week's Responsorial Psalm is posted. This is definitely not something that can be delivered to all parishioners on a bulletin.
Everything I focused on here are what I have found to be the an encouraging use of 微信 as an evangelizing tool in China. There are drawbacks and controversies involved with WeChat in general. However, I am most interested in which ways the Catholic Church functions and even thrives in this environment.
The QR code was for a link to the parish's WeChat subscription account. I was already subscribed, as I was to the Seminary's WeChat service account.
WeChat (in Chinese 微信 Wēixìn), for the uninitiated, is an essential social media app in China. To describe it, many people rely on Western analogs, like Twitter and Facebook, but those don't adequately capture the full functionality of the application. Yes, with Twitter and Facebook inaccessible in China, we rely on WeChat for communicating and information sharing, but it also used much beyond that. It's a wallet, it's a calendar, it's a news site, it's a marketplace---and so many more things that I don't even know about. In addition, everything is organized chronologically, and by account, so in a glance one can distinguish the most recent posts from any subscription.
Service accounts, by the way, displayed as chat messages.
Our parish has both a WeChat subscription account, which is permitted to publish up to once a day, and a service account, which can post about once a week. Between the two, the information normally found in printed parish bulletins can be broadcast. Special events, Holy Week schedules, Faith Formation activities, even news from Vatican Radio are often listed when one of these types of accounts publishes an update.
Sometimes there will be entries with photos of a recent Mass or meeting.
Beyond the kinds of information that could distributed on paper, we also receive multi-media posts. Sometimes we receive a recording and a transcript of that Sunday's homily. These have been excellent for me to test how we we understood or did not understand what the priest was saying. Myles likes to look at it, too, if only to see how long the homily was.
Often, the text and music for the following week's Responsorial Psalm is posted. This is definitely not something that can be delivered to all parishioners on a bulletin.
Everything I focused on here are what I have found to be the an encouraging use of 微信 as an evangelizing tool in China. There are drawbacks and controversies involved with WeChat in general. However, I am most interested in which ways the Catholic Church functions and even thrives in this environment.
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