The Carmelite Web Site

The members of the commission, William Harry, O. Carm., Councilor General for Communications, Tony Lester, O. Carm., Provincial of the British Province, Rey Caigoy, O. Carm., from the Philippine Commissariat of the Dutch Province, and Anthony Cilia, O. Carm., of the General Curia met at 9.30 A.M. and again at 4:30 PM each day. Roberto Russo, O. Carm., Director of Centro Stampa Italiano (The Italian Province Communications Office) was unable to attend due to illness.

The meeting started with the general orientation: welcoming the members, reviewing the agenda, and settling with the schedule.

In order to know what’s going on, the group set time to review the existing documents on communications. From there we have to pick-out key ideas pertaining to what the documents are saying to us? What is our purpose as a commission, our responsibilities, and where are we going to?

promote internationality/worldwide
evaluate the use of media
formulate job description for the delegate for social communication
suggest ways to improve communications
promote communication
resource/educate for communication: cultural heritage, language skills, literary and artistic heritage – as a resource of today and not as record of yesterday
audit for communications or any materials – who gets citoc, other curia mailings and who should get them; what are materials for
provide examples of quality products
refine/evaluate policy statements
meeting of those "doing" the communications
looking at ways of bringing people together electronically

B. What we, the commission, need to suggest to others:

discernment for effective use of media and to communicate values not only information
evaluation of the use of media
promote building of communities
build network: internal among ourselves and external among public media
that each Carmelite Institute have an ‘electronic division’
formation of skills: silence as a means of communication, listening, use of modern means of communication, communication, public speaking
communication representative of the province
educate for communication: cultural heritage, language skills, literary and artistic heritage
audit of communication
provide example of quality products
refine/evaluate policy statements
twinning between provinces to make communications (& funding for) accessible to all
appoint representative/meeting of these representatives
provinces should have an internet presence: web or email
train people to handle "tech" side

C. Purpose of Communication: Information

increase effectiveness of apostolate (being what we are meant to be.")
producing attractive materials
secular media as source of Carmelite spirituality and Carmelite spirituality as a source for secular media. Reading media with Carmelite "eyes".
Our internationality is one of the distinctive thing we bring to communication

Ad-intra:

producing attractive materials
political implications to communications
key to building international fraternity

IV. Formulation of the Goal of the Commission

The International Communication Commission has the charge (from the General Chapter of 2001) to promote communications in the Order.
- We will continually reflect and refine and communications policy statement of the Order.
- We will carry out an audit of the use of different communication media used in our provinces and communities.
- We will promote the Order's discernment and evaluation of our use of media.
- We will facilitate provision of resources in res carmelitana: our cultural, literary, and artistic heritage as a resource for today and not just a record of yesterday.
- We will bring together those involved in doing communication.
- We will foster ways of forming community electronically.
- We will encourage quality published materials.
- We, the Councilor General for Communications and the International Communications Commission, will fulfil the role of the Delegate for Social Communications.
- We will work towards an equitable balance between the developed and less developed provinces in terms of access to and acquisition of the means of communication.

Within 5 years (in preparation for the General Chapter of 2007):
- We will have established and focussed a strong presence in communication as a way of making Carmelite Spirituality accessible to the people.
- To accomplish this, we will utilize various strategies:
    Publishing
    Internet
    Media education in all levels of our formation
    Networking Carmelites with the media
- We believe that communication builds community. Carmelites - friars, nuns, and Lay Carmelites - will have an increased sense of being part of an international family and that they will be aware of how to live Carmelite life with greater authenticity.

The commission then discussed the scope and content of the Communication Audit. Once a typed copy of the proposed audit was completed, this was reviewed. A number of suggestions were made. The audit will be sent to each Provincial with the request that it be completed by whichever person is doing the work in the particular area for that particular part of the audit.

(Refer to Appendix A: Audit, Appendix B: Letter to Provincials, Appendix C: Letter to Nuns and Affiliated Congregations and Institutes.)

A. International Carmelite Library Project
Following a meeting in Washington, DC, it was agreed that that card catalogues of the various Carmelite collections be published and accessible on Internet. The Washington library is ready to be placed on the internet and will be followed by Aylesford, Rome and Nijmegen.
Bearing in mind that book thieves use such catalogues as a way of identifying rare and valuable books, it is suggested that any such should be listed as being in a "special collection" so that visitors will need to provide proper identification before having access to these items. Another meeting of librarians is scheduled for after Easter 2003.

B. Sources Carmelitarum
At present Adrian Staring’s presentation of the documents in their original languages is available on Internet. The Culture Commission will be asked to further this project.

C. The Carmelite NGO (Non Governmental Organization of the United Nations)
The Carmelites were approved by the United Nations on 14th December 2001 through an application by the Congregation of Our Lady of Mount Carmel (Louisiana, USA). At the end of May, three friars will attend an orientation meeting at the United Nations in New York, USA.
We are listed as an NGO-DPI (Department of Public Information) which means that we have agreed to be a source for making available material from the U.N. (A web presence will be developed and each Province or monastery with a website will be asked to include a link to this Carmelite NGO site. Perhaps a new domain name needs to be registered to allow for the full development of a Carmelite NGO site.
In September 2002, Carlos Mesters, William Harry, Míceál O’Neill and members of the Congregation of Our Lady of Mount Carmel will attend the annual general meeting of the NGO’s in New York.

D. Lectio Divina On Line
This has been in place since the 1st Sunday of Lent 2002 and there has been good feedback, mainly from lay people. A problem is with getting the material translated into 3 languages. A suggestion was made that it might be possible to use text from our saints for Lectio on line.

E. SPIRIN
This is a project sponsored by the Dutch Province and seeks to network institutes of spirituality to share information. The Dutch Carmelites are also seeking to network of the various Carmelite Institutes.

F. Distance Learning by Internet
This is being pioneered by the Dutch Carmelites. The plan is to actually have courses run from the internet with students having some residential element to their courses. At present it would be possible to fulfil this residential requirement in Nijmegen, S. Africa or the Philippines.

G. Systems of Communication within the Curia
The group studied a document giving proposed systems of communications both within the Curia and between the Provinces and the Curia.

A) Translation of Documents
Translation of documents, etc, is always a problem as everything has to be translated into the three official languages of the Order. A problem in engaging the services of a professional translator is that they often do not understand the technical theological spiritual/Carmelite terminology which we take for granted.
More help needs to come from within the Order. The group was asked to suggest names of people who may be able to take on this task. It was noted that with the end of initial formation in Rome the Order was no longer creating future translators.
A list of possible translators will be developed and help sought from them.

B) Use of Email in the Order
All Provincial Offices except 2 have email access .We propose that each Provincial Office have access to email.
This raises some security issues. Good advice is not to include material in an email that you would not include in open postcard! It would need to be clear that email is for the sharing of non-confidential material/information.

C) Training in Basic Skills of the Use of the Internet
The possibility of having a monthly input by email (a kind of toolbox) was discussed. These would be simple hints or examples helping the brethren to develop basic skills in the use of the internet and email.

D) CITOC via Internet vs Printed Copies
We discussed as to whether or not we need to produce hard copies of CITOC now that it is available via the Internet? Perhaps hard copies need to go only to libraries and archives.

E) Publication Using Newer Media
There was some discussion on whether or not the Institutum Carmelitanum could produce some of its books on other media i.e. CD. It was noted that not only is the present system of each community receiving a copy of everything very wasteful, it also means that there is no incentive for the Institutum to produce books which actually meet the needs of the brothers in the communities -they have a self perpetuating system.

F) Mega Index of Carmelite Sites
This would enable a proper index on material available on the various Carmelite websites across the world. It would also be proper use of the .info domains. At present we are aware that two of these have been registered: carmelite.info (British Province) and carmelites.info (Curia). We strongly urge that carmelitani.info and carmelitas.info be registered to the Order as soon as possible. It was agreed that William Harry should begin work on the index in English as the first language to be indexed.

G) General Chapter Website
There was very positive feedback bout the website. We felt that any international meeting of the Order (Council of Provinces, General Congregation) should have a similar site which would come into being at the time of the convocation of the meeting and contain news of the meeting itself until its final documents.
We felt that a part of the secretariat of each meeting should be a webmaster. There should be good liaison between him and the preparatory commission to ensure that he has access to the various documents in the official languages.

H) News from the International Commissions
We agreed that it would be a positive step if the ocarm.org website contained a page for each of the Commissions of the Order. These pages would contain the minutes in full (excepting confidential items) in the language of publication. An extract would be published in the three official languages via CITOC-online.

I) Promoting Discussion of Official Documents
There was some discussion on the use of Bulletin Boards with one suggestion being that we begin to explore their use by publishing a document and then inviting comment/discussion. It was agreed to check to see if pcn.net (ISP for ocarm.org) provides this service.

J) Standardizing Carmelite Email Addresses
One of the advantages of carmelnet.org is that it provides a standard form of email address which is easily remembered. It was agreed to ask Charlie Kwiatkowski (PCM) who coordinated this mailing list if he would be willing for us to advertise this service across the Order.

K) Coordination of What Is Posted on the Web
We continued with discussion on ways to achieve better coordination of web within the Order. There was some discussion on what is published on the web and the question of duplication. As a matter of simple courtesy an individual 's permission should be sought before their work is published. The development of the Mega Index of Carmelite Websites should enable webmasters to check to see if they are about to duplicate work already published.
There was also some discussion about legal issues and questions of copyright. This topic needs further exploration.
We discussed the advisability of publishing material on the Internet if it could be sold in printed form.

Josef Jancar, the General Councilor for Lay Carmelites, joined the meeting to discuss questions concerning Lay Carmel. The Lay Carmelite Commission will meet at the end of May and one item on their agenda will be communication, including the Isidore Bakanja Bulletin.
There is a proposa1 to have a Lay Carmel Secretariat but this has obvious funding issues. It is hoped to publish an international directory of Third Order groups. Tony Cilia offered to provide Josef Jancar with the information which is already published on ocarm.org.
It was suggested that perhaps CITOC could be adapted so that it includes a section for Lay Carmel or even that it become a publication for the whole Carmelite Family.
The suggestion was made that all Lay Carmel groups/chapters/communities be encouraged to have at least one member who has access to email. In this way communication would be aided. Josef Jancar left the meeting.

The discussion moved on to possible ways of improving communication with the Carmelite nuns. At present there are 74 monasteries of Carmelite Nuns. Each receives a letter twice a year from the Prior General, copies of the documents of the Order, the written version of CITOC, and those we have email addresses for receive CITOC-online. These are sent out in the three languages. It was suggested that in the countries where the friars translate these documents further, they could also provide the nuns with a copy.
It was noted that there is often very good communication amongst the monasteries especially in those areas where there is a federation.
The Curia is encouraging the nuns to have email access and their own websites. William Harry was asked to remind Joe Chalmers to include reference to this in his June 2002 letter. It was also noted that there will be a meeting for the delegates to the nuns and some of the nuns themselves in 2003.

Joseph Chalmers commented on the good experience of the meeting between the General Council and the Dutch Province Daily Board (the Provincial and two Co-Provincials). He suggested that this could be recommended to other Provincial Councils.

XI. Strategies for Impacting Formation Programs and the Training of Communicators

Joseph Chalmers made the suggestion that the Communications Commission might make contact with those organising the ongoing formation course for priors next year to ensure that there is a communications component to the course.
We encourage Carmelites to study a second language (Constitutions #160), especially Italian, English, or Spanish, the three official languages of the Order. In this way we will be able to communicate better among ourselves and grow in our fraternity. (We agreed to include another item about this subject in the audit.)
The members of the commission are in favour that the formation programmes include communication skills and that our members should receive training in the means of modern communications.
The commission will provide information and documents to the formators about communications (e.g.: links to the websites of the Salesians, Jesuits and Paoline media centres, and the document "Future Priests and Social Communications").

A) Priors: Since the role of the prior is to facilitate communication (cf. Constitutions 31) and in view of the next On-Going Formation course being focused on the role of the prior, we need to contact Alexander Vella, Director of the On-Going Formation, and suggest the following:
(i) a talk about the values and the use of media in community and how these means contribute to the community life;
(ii) a practical session about the use of internet and e-mail.

B) Provincials and Councilors: It is very helpful that Provincials and Councilors communicate not only with the members of their province but also with the rest of the Order by sending the right information (Council minutes, reports, brief notes on decisions of provincial chapters, etc.) to the General Secretary of the Order and to the person in charge of communications (CITOC).

C) Prior Generals and General Councilors: The Prior General and the General Councilors are encouraged to communicate the minutes of the General Council meetings and brief write-ups about their activities to the rest of the Order.

The Communications Commission reviewed the history and statutes of the Edizioni Carmelitane from the 1995 General Chapter. A discussion about the present situation of the publishing house followed.
A) The members agreed that the General Councilor responsible for communications should be an ex-officio member of the commission in charge of the publishing house of the Curia.
B) The statues of the Edizioni Carmelitane should be reviewed with the help of the Commission for Culture.
C) With regards to marketing and the quality of the products, we also agreed that the present system of circulation (that every Carmelite house receives automatically a copy of every publication produced by the "Edizioni Carmelitane") is hindering any improvement in presentation and in marketing of our publications.
D) There should also be an evaluation of the distribution of the scientific publications to insure that our products are reaching the right audience and libraries.
E) Steps should be taken to develop:
i) a network of those who are producing Carmelite material,
ii) an effective system of production and marketing.

Lack of communication is as bad as ‘over communication’! There is a need for timely, clear, and appropriate communication.
We feel we are far from ‘over communicating’ at this point. We do believe, however, that people should be aware that e-mails should be sent for useful purposes.

Before closing this session, the members of the commission agreed to give whatever assistance they can to the Congress on the 8^th centenary of the Rule of St. Albert being developed by the Commission for Charism and Spirituality.
There was also a request from the Formation Commission for assistance in placing their strategies for reading the RATIO on the Internet. While the RATIO is already on the British and Irish websites in English, the Communications Commission will provide whatever assistance we can to the Formation Commission.

A) The International Commission for Communications
The general goals of our commission are outlined in #4 of these notes. We understand that the responsibility given to us at the 2001 General Chapter was to promote communications in the Order.
Our basic thrusts will be to complete an audit of communications in the Order and a second audit in 5 years to measure the growth in the communications throughout the Order. We will increase out presence on the web and make access to the materials on the Internet more accessible. We will clarify the lines of communication up and down the various levels of the Order. We will promote integration of communication into formation education. We will also assist in networking Carmelites who wish with Carmelite expertise in the various aspects of communications.
We understand that communications in the Order embraces the various media. The expertise on this commission is heavily weighted towards expertise in the Internet. We feel there is a real lack of representation from the print media and other forms of electronic media. Perhaps the audit will offer us the names of people from those sectors of communications.

B) The General Councilor for Communications
i) Convene and facilitate the work of the International Communications Commission
ii) Is responsible to general communications between the General Curia and the Order
iii) Gives input into the official publishing policies of the Order

C) Web Master for the General Curia Website
i) Develops and maintains the website of the General Curia of the Order

The next meeting of the commission will be held September 18-20, 2002 at the General Curia in Rome. The main topic will be analyzing the results of the communications audit.

Purpose of the Audit:
1) to learn what provinces, monasteries, affiliated congregations and institutes are doing in communications;
2) to learn who is doing the work in communications;
3) to be able to measure progress in 5 years when we do a second audit communications in the Order in preparation for the 2007 General Chapter.

Please distribute the following sheets to the person or persons who are doing the work of communications in that area listed.

Use of Internet
Name of Person Completing this Section: _______________________________________
Y N Does the Province have a website? Person doing this: _________________________
Y N If yes, does it link to the Order’s website (www.ocarm.org)
Y N Does the Provincial website link to other Carmelite websites?
Y N Does the Provincial website contain information for non Carmelites?
Y N Does the Provincial website contain information for other Carmelites?
Y N Does the Provincial website contain information about Carmelite cultural heritage?
Y N Does the Provincial website contain information about Carmelite literary heritage?
Y N Does the Provincial website contain information about Carmelite artistic heritage?
Y N Is the website changed regularly (if yes, circle one: weekly, monthly, annually)
Y N Are ‘chat rooms’ used for discussion of Carmelite topics?
Y N Are the email and provincial website addresses on official stationary and publications of the Province/Communities?
Y N Do you use the internet in vocation promotion?
Y N Is there a website or websites for the Lay Carmelites associated with your Province?
If yes, who is doing this website? ___________________________________
Y N Does it link to other Lay Carmelite websites?
Y N Does it contain information to outsiders?
Y N Does it contain links to the Order, province, monastery, or congregation?
How many members of the Province use email? ________________
Y N Is email used by the Province to distribute official news-information?
Y N Is an email mailing list of members maintained by the Province?