March 28 Online day of reflection on Ustream

[Sean McGaughey]

Several people have asked me if I will be doing another daily project
for Lent. Last year we did 40 days of Catholic Media for lent
(actually it was closer to 50 days), and a little over a month for the
Catholic New Media Advent Calendar. Together they required almost 4
months of daily preparation, promotion etc... After prayer and
discussion with my lovely wife, Nancy, this has proven to be too time
consuming given my family commitments, other volunteer work, other
podcasts, and my work as a first grade teacher.

But we're not out of the game. The Catholic Roundup is here
to serve and help foster the community of online Catholic bloggers,
podcasters, plurkers, musicians and coders.

We would like to facilitate an online Lenten day of reflection for
Catholic new media producers (bloggers, podcasters, etc...) and the
appreciative audience members in the community.

When: Saturday March 28
(several hours -- say 9 amEST to 4:30 pm EST) This will depend upon
the number of contributors/sessions we can gather.
Where: On the innertubes: Over ustream and talkshoe (or using a
dedicated online conference service).
What: The same sort of model as the Catholic New Media Advent
Calendar. Different people from different parts of the world sign up
to ustream or facilitate discussions or talks on talkshoe at different
times throughout the day.
I figure we could have 3 or 4 main strands.
1) Prayer and reflection: Obviously we cannot attend a mass together,
but we can do liturgy of the hours, rosary, stations of the cross or
other forms of group prayer. If I can find a cooperative ustreaming
priest perhaps we could even have online adoration and benediction??
I already have a guided reflection and a very cool rosary in the
works. Other suggestions for prayer times during the day are welcome.

2) Times for spiritual discussion and reflection on Lenten themes.

3) Podcamp style discussions and talks about how to use New Media to
spread the Good News and the challenges of evangelizing online.

4) Musical performances.

5) Open discussions using text or voice chat.

6) Icebreakers and funny bits.

I'm envisioning a kind of geeky day of reflection to help nourish
those of us involved in creating Catholic new media, giving a bit of
knowledge to those who want to try blogging or podcasting, and provide
a fun day of new media for fans.

I'm thinking of inviting a few offline friends over to the house for
prayer support, technical assistance and to join in the day of
reflection.

What do all of you think?
Any comments or suggestions before I undertake this new event?

Pax,

Sean McGaughey

[James and Jodi]

I'm sorry but we will be out of town that day.