Description: Use the suggestions in this program to start a spirituality blog, which will enable young adults to share their faith with one another outside of Mass. This blog has the potential to reach young adults who aren’t already a part of the parish community.
Get Ready
- Prep Time: It likely will take about four weeks to find your contributors, brainstorm your topics, and actually get the blog itself up and running. Blog posts usually can be scheduled to go online in advance, so the prep time on the day of an actual post is usually pretty minimal.
- Volunteers Needed:
- Contributing Writers (four or more): These writers commit to writing a blog post on a topic of their choosing once a month or more.
- Editor (one): This coordinator oversees timely submission of blog posts, checks content for appropriateness, keeps an eye on the comments, and rotates art or banners with the change of liturgical seasons, etc.
- Artist (one): This parishioner with artistic gifts is capable of designing art/banners for the blog. This designing can be done by hand and then scanned, or it can be done on the computer, depending on the capabilities of the artist. This artist also can design images to go along with blog posts, use photographs from young adults in your group, or use images he/she finds on websites like Creative Commons. (Be sure you select images that have the appropriate copyright license and that you credit photographers for their work.)
- Supplies: One of the advantages of this program is that it can be done from anywhere with a reliable computer and an Internet connection. Most blogging resources even have apps that enable you to update posts from your mobile phone.
- Reserve the (Web) Space: Be sure to reserve your website by setting up an account with your format of choice (e.g., WordPress, Blogger, etc.). If you want to reserve a free domain name, you can reserve one that incorporates the name of the format (e.g. http://staugyoungadults.wordpress.com). For a few dollars per year, you can also reserve one that stands alone (e.g. http://fromthepewsintheback.com).
- Who is this for? All young adults will be able to read the blog — and anyone can comment. You might find that more young adults in your group who are writers or like to write may want to contribute when things are up and running.
- When is a good time for this? Advent is a great time to prepare so your blog can launch for the New Year.
- Publicize the Program:
- Advertise the blog in the parish bulletin and announce it from the pulpit when it is close to your launch date.
- Send out an announcement to the young adult ministry e-mail list, as well as the parish e-mail list more broadly. Let folks know they can sign up to receive notification e-mails about new blog posts. (This will vary with different blog software, so you might give more specific instructions for your blog.)
- Post a link to your spirituality blog on your parish website and specifically your young adult ministry webpage. You should also post links on your Facebook and Twitter pages.
- When a new post goes live, be sure to post a link to that specific post on your young adult ministry Facebook and Twitter pages. You can use a social media scheduler like Hootsuite to help you schedule posts in advance.
Prayer for Program Planner: God Who Made All Things, Thank you for the gifts of creativity and community. Help me connect young adults with spiritual sustenance for service, especially in the form of the most vulnerable members of our communities. Amen.
Community Building: Your blog has the potential to build an online community and provide helpful peer ministry to young adults who seek support in their faith lives from one another between Monday and Saturday, so to speak. If a young adult ministry would like to incorporate an online component, it is vital that the online connections enhance the in-person connections being made at the parish. A blog also can be used to advertise for in-person social and community-building activities in the parish.
