parish prayer services, school events, digital pilgrimages, etc. are ways that Catholics in the United States can experience WYD without getting on a plane. The journey is for all. Understanding the young people on this journey – and the community from which they come( and to where they will be going next) – is key to better appreciating the people that God has put into your care. young people see as many as 3,000 advertisements per day 4 and will view 200,000 acts of violence in the media by the age of 18. 5 Eleven years ago, advertisers spent in excess of 17 billion dollars on marketing to teens per year. 6 These statistics are quite high and the impulse of the concerned parent or ministry is to counteract the onslaught of secular media by adding sacred media to the flood.
Pilgrimage in the Digital Age There is a general eagerness on the part of those who minister to young people to jump into the latest technology, like the eagerness of a missionary who wants to enter into the native culture. The New Evangelization often seems to require a variety of media to reach youth and young adults because these generations are so digitally connected.
Reports suggest that the average young person spends 3 hours a day watching television 2 and as much as nine hours a day using media in general( checking social media, playing video games, watching Youtube videos, etc.). 3 Through multiple platforms,
Researchers conducted studies demonstrating that“ Facebook envy” is a reality plaguing those who use social media regularly. Someone viewing images on social media sees“ happy” people all the time; meanwhile, real life is never happy all the time. Envy may surface over a friend’ s good looks, vacation pictures, new job, boyfriend or girlfriend, or baby. The research showed that 36 % of respondents in the survey demonstrated negative reactions to what they saw on Facebook, including sadness, envy, boredom, frustration, loneliness, anger, and so forth. 7
Keeping this in mind, leaders of dioceses, eparchies, parishes, and religious groups who
2 https:// medlineplus. gov / ency / patientinstructions / 000355. htm
3 http:// www. cnn. com / 2015 / 11 / 03 / health / teens-tweensmedia-screen-use-report / index. html
4 Goodman E. Ads pollute most everything in sight. Albuquerque Journal. June 27, 1999: C3
5 Senate Committee on the Judiciary. Children, violence, and the media: a report for parents and policy makers. September 14, 1999.
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6 James McNeil quoted in Horovitz, B.( 2006, November 22). Six Strategies Marketers use to Make Kids Want Things Bad. USA Today, p. 1B
7 Krasnova, Hanna, and Helena Wenninger, Thomas Widjaj, and Peter Buxmann.“ Envy on Facebook: A Hidden Threat to User’ s Life Satisfaction?” Institute of Information Systems, Humbolt-Universität zu Berlin: Berlin, Germany( with Technische Universität Darmstadt: Darmstadt, Germany). February 27, 2013.