The document emphasizes the necessity of media mindfulness as a spiritual and educational imperative, urging individuals to engage critically with media while recognizing its capacity to reflect deeper human desires and the presence of God. It highlights the responsibilities of parents and the Christian community in guiding children to navigate the media landscape responsibly and ethically. The text also suggests various spiritual practices and reflections aimed at fostering a more mindful approach to popular culture and media consumption.

1. Media Mindfulness: A Pauline Formational Imperative
Pauline Center for Media Studies
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2. Prayer to Be Media Mindful
Spirit of Wisdom, you breathe life into humanity to discover
and create technologies that promote global communication
through the sharing of information and entertainment. These
gifts of God give expression to the desires and yearnings of
humanity through the art of popular culture.
Teach us to engage mindfully with the media, discovering
the seeds of grace present there, while seeking to
understand the needs of humanity today, always ready to
propose Christ as the fulfiller of all our hopes and longings.
Assist us with your grace, O Divine Spirit! Help us to use
these means to discern the signs of the times, to search for
a Christian response, and to derive motives for prayer.
We ask this through the perfect Communicator, Jesus our
Master and Lord. Amen.
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—based on a prayer in Live Christ! Give Christ!
“The form will change but the Word of God will endure.”
—Bl. James Alberione

3. Pope Francis
“We are living in an information-driven society which bombards us indiscriminately with data—all treated as being of
equal importance—and which leads to remarkable superficiality in the area of moral discernment. In response, we need
to provide an education which teaches critical thinking and encourages the developments of mature moral values.”
—Pope Francis, Joy of the Gospel, n. 64
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4. The Founder
“We should always lead people to paradise, but we have to lead there not those who lived ten
centuries ago, but those who live today. In order to do good today, we have to take the world and
the people as they are today. Stretch forward. Always keep in mind what is wanting in us. There is
no time to congratulate ourselves on the past.”
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5. The New Evangelization for the Transmission
of the Christian Faith, n. 6:
“The new evangelization is a frame of mind, a courageous manner of acting and Christianity’s capacity to know
how to read and interpret the new situations in human history which, in recent decades, have become the places
to proclaim and witness to the Gospel….These sectors concern society, cultures, economics, civic life, and religion…
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6. Mysticism
• “The soul which unites itself to God
speaks only the language of love. All
of its prayers are expressions of the
love of God.” —Blessed Alberione
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7. Cultural Mysticism
“To embody the ideal of the popular cultural
mystic is a spiritual exercise in recognizing
God’s presence in the world and especially in
the artistic questioning in regard to human
experience that ferments in popular culture.”
—A Sacred Look: Becoming Cultural Mystics
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8. Discussion
1. Think of a popular film or television show. What deep existential desire does it address? If so, how?
2. How did that speak to your relationship with God? With others? With self?
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9. Take a Sacred Look
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hear the cries of humanity; the yearning for meaning, the longing for justice, for love, for hope

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11. Anthropological
Incarnational
Sacramental
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15. God’s Grace at Work in the World
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16. Media Mindfulness
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Lectio Divina/theological reflection and media literacy inquiry
are the models for media mindfulness strategy

17. Media Mindfulness
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Theo. Refl & LD Media Mindfulness Media Literacy
Listen What’s going on? Access
Reflect What’s really going on? Analyze
Dialogue What difference does it make? Evaluate
Act What difference can I make? ParAcipate/Create

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Media Mindfulness and Catechesis

19. • By growing daily in our awareness of the vital importance
of encountering others, these “new possibilities”, we will
employ technology wisely, rather than letting ourselves be
dominated by it. Here too, parents are the primary
educators, but they cannot be left to their own devices. The
Christian community is called to help them in teaching
children how to live in a media environment in a way
consonant with the dignity of the human person and service
of the common good. – Pope Francis 49th WCD
• The relationship of children, media, and education can be
considered from two perspectives: the formation of children
by the media; and the formation of children to respond
appropriately to the media. A kind of reciprocity emerges
which points to the responsibilities of the media as an
industry and to the need for active and critical participation
of readers, viewers and listeners. Within this framework,
training in the proper use of the media is essential for the
cultural, moral and spiritual development of children.
–Benedict XVI 41st WCD
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20. Values Articulation
What are my values? What are the Gospel values?
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21. Media Mindfulness
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23. Media Mindfulness
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24. Pauline Way of
Catechesis
• Whole Christ for the whole person
• forming engaged users/creators of the
popular media culture
• spiritual practices with a media
literacy pedagogy
• Media Spirituality
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25. Media Spirituality
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26. Spiritual Practices
• Be-Attitudes of Social Media
• Canticle of Praise for the Media
• Examination of Conscience for My Online Life
• Litany of Media Saints for Media Mindfulness
• Praying the media—Cinema Divina, Praying
the News, etc.
• Praying for media professionals
• Praying for celebrities
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bemediamindful.org

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How can you be more media mindful?
What will you do to be a cultural mystic?