PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil, FEB. 8, 2010 (Zenit.org).- The president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications presented in Brazil an online directory for Catholic media, recently translated into Portuguese.
The Web portal, www.intermirifica.net, was launched in November in Spanish, but it is now available in English, Italian and Portuguese.
Archbishop Claudio Celli, the council’s president, presented the portal last week during a communications conference for Latin America and the Caribbean, held at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre.
He pointed out that in Brazil alone there are more than 180 Catholic radio stations, and that there are many possibilities for synergy, exchange and mutual collaboration through this Web portal.
The archbishop affirmed that the «task we have as disciples of the Lord» is to make sure that there are no parts of the body disconnected from the rest, to ensure that there is communication among all, «as each one has much to contribute and to receive.»
«That is why a priority for us is to reduce the digital gaps even within the Church itself,» he noted.
The online directory was designed in collaboration with the Latin American Episcopal Conference and SIGNIS, the World Catholic Association for Communication, to collect and provide information on Catholic media around the globe.
The directory has a «wiki» structure, meaning that it is designed to be completed and updated by users. It also functions as a search engine for radio or television stations and for production companies.
The name intermirifica refers to the only document from the Second Vatican Council dedicated to social communications.
The site explains that the portal «hopes to become ‘the yellow pages’ of the Church’s mass media.»
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On the Net:
Web portal: http://www.intermirifica.net/