Today President Obama held a Q&A with America on YouTube. Was it really just 6 years ago when we were amazed that presidential candidate Howard Dean could actually use the Internet to connect with college students?
We are marching, sometimes reluctantly, toward another shift in the definition of Normal. Normal for every home in America used to include a kitchen wall phone with a formerly curly cord stretched beyond all recognition. I bet your definition of Normal now has a cordless phone in it, or a mobile phone, or maybe both. In my new Normal, soon I won't have a standard telephone on my desk at all. (Geez - that blew my mind just to type the words.)
Technology, slang, social mores...we zig when society zags. The smart ones among us figure out how to do it sooner, and better, instead of fighting the change that is surely going to occur. It helps when our leaders, however you define that word, are early adopters we can believe in. Sadly, President Obama's continual use of social media fuels arguments against him by people who are challenged to e-mail.
It makes me wonder if FDR got flack for speaking on the radio instead of crisscrossing the country. Knowing human behavior as I do, I'm guessing somebody in the land of fruited plains used the Fireside Chats as ammunition. Pity.
Much like the stories of early Native Americans refusing to pose for photographs they feared would steal their souls, it doesn't surprise me that there are always those who see evil in technology. I'm just glad that for every naysayer there's an innovator like, say, Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen. Ever heard of him?
For 2 decades, 1930 to 1950, Sheen hosted an evening radio show, The Catholic Hour. He followed that with two television programs, Life is Worth Living (1951-57) and the syndicated The Fulton Sheen Program (1961-68).
That's where I come in, a little Goddess-in-training sitting on the floor in front of a large black-and-white TV set. I remember Archbishop Sheen because he scared me to death. I thought he looked mean, and the capelet he wore did little to stop me from thinking that he looked like Christopher Lee playing Dracula.
Truth is, Archbishop Sheen deserves to be recognized as one of the first televangelists, scary or not. The timeline of his broadcasting career echoes that of another committed man of faith, Rev. Billy Graham.
Rev. Graham started his phenomenally popular radio show, Hour of Decision, in 1950. It's still on the air.
He had his own show on ABC-TV from 1951 to 1954, but it was the televised broadcasts of the Billy
Graham Crusades every year from 1957 to 1995 that reinforced what we would now call the Billy Graham brand. Every year, back-to-back nights of network Prime Time (in the days when it rated initial caps) were turned over to a man shouting the Gospel in huge stadiums full of people.
He had his own show on ABC-TV from 1951 to 1954, but it was the televised broadcasts of the Billy
Graham Crusades every year from 1957 to 1995 that reinforced what we would now call the Billy Graham brand. Every year, back-to-back nights of network Prime Time (in the days when it rated initial caps) were turned over to a man shouting the Gospel in huge stadiums full of people.Both men used the technology of their times to bring the word of their faith to millions. That pulpit must have felt pretty hot in the beginning, but look at the multi-faceted televangelist universe that followed.
Do you doubt for a minute that both Sheen and Graham would be online now? I don't. In fact, you can listen to the Hour of Decision online or download an MP3 of the Archbishop's programs.
It's all a nice history lesson, but there's more. Archbishop Sheen is being considered for sainthood (apparently there may be a miracle or 2 in his resume). If canonized, he will be the first saint with an Emmy. Now that's communications history!
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