Is Facebook kosher?
Q. Do you agree with the Pope’s endorsement of online social media, such as Facebook?
A. Some years ago, “Time” Magazine carried a headline, “Social Media Okayed by the Pope”.
I entirely agree with the Pope’s reported position.
Online social media have made communication so much easier and more user-friendly.
One of the hardest things about being human is when other people ignore you or push past as if you were a nobody. Fortunately, the development of online communication has made it possible for everyone to be a somebody.
I know that electronic means of communication can be abused and made into a weapon to wound other people, saying obnoxious things about them or to them. Indeed the Book of Proverbs says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue” (Prov. 18:21).
In today’s world of course the word “tongue” must be understood in an extended way. That is why society should have an agreed ethic about how to use social media, but just because a facility can be misused is no reason to ban it.
