The World of Facebook

“I am happy and surprised to have found you on Facebook. It’s really a fabulous world where I easily find new friends. I don't understand why so many others, above all mature and serious people like you, are criticizing these new possibilities. For me it's a very innovative creation, because it allows me to meet so many people.”
E.Z.

I don't consider myself as a mature and serious person, but always as someone on a journey and making discoveries with the help of so many companions along life’s journey. For this reason, before the innovations in the modern means of communication, I try to listen and understand the different opinions that I hear and see. I try to act, in a manner consistent with what I believe in and cautious about what the world offers me.

Facebook, with almost hundreds of millions of consumers today, and as the most widespread social network in the Internet, is a phenomenon that worries me just like the effects of Internet. It’s a means of communication just like the internet that gives rise to justified fears, as has always occurred with a new means of communication.

Your reaction seems to me a valid one, but it seems to me more useful if together we can try to see the whole picture. First, we need to remember that Facebook is not a new world, even if it creates a world which we define as virtual. It’s a simple means of communication! Like every means of communication, it has good and bad sides to it, just like its ability to multiply and to spread the news it receives, and the way it transmits positive or negative items.

For instance, every day I try to build true relationships, and I can do it online, happy to be able to establish contacts with people far way, as well as help others journey together in life. In just four months of registration in Facebook, I can contact more than 400 companions in life’s journey from the whole world. Surely, this is amazing! But there will be always a great risk of superficiality in these relationships.

It will thus be necessary, as when one finds oneself in a crowded conference room where one knows so many people, not to stop and chat with everybody, not to be overcome by curiosity about everyone, but to understand who needs us and dedicate our full attention to that person. So many times then, you will also discover that your nearest neighbor is he who needs your help... and you will just have to turn off your computer.

Francesco Chatel

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You’re Very Special

“I don’t know my real dad and I am really angry because I was the fruit of casual sex. It’s very difficult to accept this. What can I do? (As this letter of Francis is quite long, we have only selected this question.)”
Francis

Dearest Francis,

Thank you for your very honest and wonderful letter which expresses who you really are: a wounded child with so much zeal and willingness to live life to the full!

Surely, it would have been better if you had been born into a complete family, in a relationship of true love- the fruit of an affectionate and tender relationship between your mother and father.

Definitely, it would have been better if you had had beside you a father since your birth to give you confidence and the necessary strength to face life’s challenges together.

It would have been better if you had been able to play with him, to go on hikes and trips with him, to laugh and joke together, perhaps also to experience some disagreements with both of your parents and later to joke with them about it after having resolved the problem, or else to be running away from them, then making up later. To sum it all up-- to dialogue and share your life with them. But it was not that way and so what are you going to do?

Dearest Francis, allow me to share some of my thoughts (as you have asked me in your letter). This will express what I feel and think on the matter.

In spite of these circumstances, you came into this world. Your mother gave birth to you with much fatigue. She cried out and the people around her heard her while she was in labor, so that you will be born.

At school too, you found some teachers who supported you. You also wrote, that you have found friends there who could laugh with you and keep you company

With all these blessings, even if you have been deeply wounded and you are carrying a lot of emotional baggage, it’s really a good thing that you are opening up. Be more open, especially to understand the pain and sufferings of others who are suffering like you. Deep within you, it’s good to transform your anger into gentleness and acceptance. That’s a better way to deal with oneself and show the world that it is really worthwhile being born into this world. You are so unique and no one else is quite like you! For this, I wish to offer you a simple reflection from a very dear friend entitled “You are Special.”

It says that you are a very special person in this world. Do you believe this? Your life itself is a small miracle. It is not important that you were left hanging and waiting in life or that you were born in the wrong circumstances. That doesn’t change anything. You have received the gift of life, here and now. You are the most special person in the world, and only you can open up this present if you live well your life. No one else has the right to be you. You are unique. So cheer up Francis!

Ezio Aceti

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