austraLasia #2583 Pause for thought....and maybe action!
ROME: 26th January 2010 --
Let this be a brief pause for thought and maybe some action on the part
of some, while we congratulate two neighbours who've had some rough
times together recently, at least press-wise (Indian students in
Australia and some retaliation at the other end for perceived
wrongs)! Australia celebrates Australia Day, or better has
celebrated it by the time this goes out, recalling that moment on 26th
January 1788 when the First Fleet arrived in Sydney Cove, although some
like to think it also celebrates the Rum Rebelliion in 1808 on the same
day - the only military coup the country has experienced! And
India, on 26th January celebrates, but here too already concluded, the
proclaiming of the Constitution of the sovereign Republic of India in
1950, although there are other associated celebrations, since India had
effectively gained independence some years before and on another
date. Anyway - congratulations to both, who are united in a great
Commonwealth of nations.
But the pause for thought comes from another
direction. Today, for one reason or another, we needed to check on some
Haiti material and we turned quickly to the Salesian official websites
(i.e. province websites) around the world. It was a bit of a shock,
really. One might think, given a Rector Major's strongest appeal
ever to the entire Congregation, the need to galvanise an already
aid-weary public and so forth, that Salesian websites worldwide would
hit you in the eye with the needs of our brothers and sisters in Haiti.
This writer went first to each of the province websites in the region -
which was where the shock began, apart from the fact that if a website
changes its URL/DNS and we don't find out about it, we won't have
it properly listed or, worse still, if a province has simply let
a former DNS go and not properly closed it, it will inevitably
have been taken over by somebody advertising something which that
province might prefer it didn't - at least in its name! This is the
case for one site in the region. But the situation is not much
better around the rest of the Salesian world, one must say, just from
this one tiny perspective of course, though there are obvious
exceptions, and one would have to expect that the New Rochelle site would be such.
It could offer some ideas to others. We do want young people to see
Jesus, and just for now let's imagine he is visiting Haiti! The two can
easily appear on the same page.
This is not a comment on the efforts that are almost
certainly being made across the Provinces and especially in the Houses.
There was no time to check the thousands of community/work
websites. But there is cause for pause....and action on the part
of those who manage our websites, is there not?
The criteria, at least for this writer, is a pretty
simple one: if I open a website and I cannot see 'Haiti' somewhat
prominently in some form or other, and a link that takes me to more on
the same, without needing to scroll, then I judge that the website does
not wish to or has not thought to promote this particular cause.
All our websites are very public. They can be a powerful medium in the
public arena,a nd if anyone were to follow the same route, i.e. check
what the 'collective' Salesian web view might be on this issue, then....
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