For too many years, the Holy See has struggled to truly connect with the youth of the world. Verily, though, by the grace of God, His Holiness and a team of Godless app developers in California have delivered unto us a wondrous creation, a magical wonder that allows the Catholic Church to touch the young and vulnerable at the time of their greatest youth and vulnerability.
See, I speak of Snapchat, son of Instagram, cousin of Facebook. Semper ubi Snapchattus sub ubi: he who Snapchatteth in the name of the Lord shall have eternal glory in the eyes of God.
Social media is truly the way of the future, as I have deemed it so, and my brothers and I have taken to Twitter to spread the word of God. But to truly get the vulnerable youth of today’s heathen society to open up, to share their inner feelings and the most intimate parts of themselves, requires a medium that is purely between the children themselves, the Catholic Church, and He Who Resides in Heaven. Snapchat is that medium, praise be to Jesus.
With Snapchat, God’s children can quickly and easily make confession to their priests via photo – they can photograph their sins, forward them, and be forgiven by a kind and understanding Father, who will always be ready to accept whatever “confession” these poor children may wish to send.
Our youth must know that the Lord is always watching over them. He is there with them in the locker room, when they are naked; He is there with them in the shower, when they are naked; and He is there with them whenever they are naked, when they are naked. For millennia, priests have been trying to touch our children at these times of great need. With Snapchat, God has finally given his adherents the solution to this ancient problem. Now, whenever our children have stripped to their soft, delicate underwear, they can connect with their local priest, whether he has been removed from the pulpit pending further investigation or not. They can send him a good-night photo or a kissy-face to show that Jesus is always in their thoughts.
Young Catholics need to know that God wants them to share their photos with him, no matter how sinful – be they shots of pubescent boys “play”-wrestling with each other, the sweat shining on their blessed singlets, or pre-teen girls experimenting at sleepovers.
Some parents – atheists, no doubt – may wish that their children turn their cheeks from the eyes of God. As Matthew writes, parents can be too intrusive in the affairs of their young children – telling them not to talk to strangers in black cloaks, asking them questions about where they were all Sunday afternoon or why their clothes are on backwards. Snapchat makes all this worrying unnecessary. As Jesus says to Mark, “Do not hinder them, but let the children come unto me, all over me, and let me come all over unto them, and there shall be much rejoicing in the kingdom of God.”
Amen.
Originally published: January 2013
