The Church Online: the Roman Catholic Church and Social Media in the Czech Republic

The article deals with how the Catholic Church is presented on the Internet, especially on social networks. It summarises the offi cial opinions of the Church about the Internet and focuses on the state of the use of social networks by the Church, with an emphasis on the Czech environment. It solves the question of interpreting the issue from the point of view of the socially scientifi c study of religion. Methodologically, it is based on a qualitative descriptive analysis of primary sources and on a quantitative analysis of pages on social networks. From an emic point of view, the presentation on social networks carries out the informational, evangelistic, and pastoral functions for the Church. The use of social networks is associated with the new evangelisation. From the ethical point of view, the text examines the issue in relation to the concept of secularisation at individual, societal, and organisational levels. Through being presented on social networking the Church responds to the individualisation and privatisation of religions. Being present on social media also helps to establish a media and public agenda of the Church, and to form, maintain, and spread religious memory. Changes in the organisational structure of the Church administration can also be observed by which the Church has responded to socio-cultural changes in modern societies.


Introduction
Th e Internet is becoming a part of religious life and gives rise to online religion, that is, religious experience and religious practice on the Internet 2 in a number of forms where their diversity is likely to grow in the future. 3 However, this study focuses rather on religion online, understood in a broad sense as information about religion that is mediated by the Internet. 4 Churches and religious societies react and adapt to the new conditions of the 'digital communication revolution' 5 which lead them towards the need to communicate in new ways using new technologies. I will focus especially on internet social media used by churches with the example of the Roman Catholic Church, 6 paying special regard to the Czech environment. Th e Internet and online social networks or social media 7 have become a common part of life in today's society. According to the Czech Statistical Offi ce data for 2016, the internet was used by 76.5% of individuals over 16, with 60.3% of individuals using it daily. 8 At the same time, according to the same survey, 41.4% of individuals older than 16 used Internet social networks. In the 16-24 age group, it was as high as 91.4% of individuals. 9 For public-sector agents, including churches and religious societies with their representatives, having a presence on the Internet and social networking is becoming a necessity. Moreover, data on the use of Internet social networks by young people show that if churches want to reach this age group, they cannot ignore having such presentations through online social media. Th e basic aim of this article is to answer the question about how the Church is presenting itself through the Internet, especially through online social networks. I will fi rst focus briefl y on the Internet presentation of the Holy See, with an emphasis on social media and attitudes to the Internet and social networking that the Holy See and the curial institutions take. Next, I will focus on attitudes and opinions on social networking, which the Czech Catholic Church itself and its representatives publicly present. However, the main aim is to provide the present state overview 10 of the presentation of the Czech ecclesiastical administration and its highest institutions and representatives on online social networks, whose outlines are the core of this study. In the fi nal part I will look for the concepts of religious science as a social-scientifi c study of religion that can be applied to today's situation of how the Catholic Church is presented on social networks.

Th eoretical-Methodological Framework
Methodologically, I use a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. Th e section devoted to the opinions of the Church and its representatives on the issue of the presentation on the Internet and especially on online social networks is based on a qualitative descriptive analysis of primary sources (in particular, the offi cial website of the institutions of the Catholic Church abroad and in the Czech Republic) as well as on the analysis of secondary literature about this issue. I will primarily use the statements and documents that the Church presents on the issue 5 Christian SMITH, Soul Searching. Th e Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005, p. 180.
As shown by research on the use of Internet social networks in the Czech environment (see footnotes 8 and 9), these kinds of media are especially popular among youth -this is a challenge for the churches and also a space for addressing this group of Internet users. As illustrated by an overview of the websites that the Catholic Church has on Facebook, many of them focus on youth (see below). 6 In the text, I will continue to use the terms Catholic Church or the Church specifi cally for the Roman Catholic Church. 7 Th e concepts of 'online / internet social networking' and 'online / internet social media' are oft en used freely in the area of everyday and professional discourse as well. I consider it appropriate to draw attention to the possibility of distinguishing their meaningful content. Th e concept of an 'internet social network' can be derived from the sociological understanding of the social network as a set of relations or mutual infl uences between the elements of the set (individuals or groups of individuals) that exist in the Internet environment. 'Internet Social Media' can be understood as an interactive Internet platform that allows the existence of an online social network (such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) and it is basically a social networking medium in the Internet environment, that is, a platform enabling relations between the network elements and their mutual communication. However, in this text I do not deviate from common practice and I use both terms as synonymous giving them the meaning of the Internet platform, social media, and social networks in the internet environment. 8 © Český statistický úřad, Informační společnost v číslech. Česká republika a EU. 2017 (online), p. 42, available at: https://www.czso.cz/ documents/10180/46014808/061004-17.pdf/26e123e0-1dde-49c3-89ce-85f7fb 85c7d4?version=1.1, cited 19 th January 2018. 9 Ibid., p. 50. 10 Th is is an overview of the status as set out below in January 2018, when the main part of this study was created. See footnote 75.

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through the internet media themselves, especially on their offi cial web platforms. An overview of the state of the Church's presentation on social networks in the Czech environment is based on a quantitative analysis of the pages available on the social networks Facebook and Twitter. To determine the range of pages I include in my report, I have used published statistical data about the use of the Internet and social networks. Th e last part, providing the perspective of religious science on the Church's presentation on social networks, is based on approaches from the fi elds of religion, sociology, and media studies. From a conceptual perspective, I look at two fundamental aspects: emic and ethical. 11 I try to sum up the attitudes of the Church and its representatives towards online presentation on social networks and I also try to summarise the possibilities of conceptualising this issue from the point of view of religious science. I will not deal in detail with the theological aspects of the issue, although these contexts cannot be completely avoided, especially if one of my themes is an emic perspective on the use of Internet social networks. Some theological concepts, such as the new evangelisation, will therefore be part of the answer to questions concerning the emic point of view. However, the theological level of the issue is not the theoretical framework of this study. Given the fact that this text is based on the paradigm of religious science as a social science, which is interdisciplinary, non-theological, and value-neutral study of religion, I interpret the theological level simply as a means of theological legitimisation of the issue in the ecclesial environment without taking any assessment opinion on this issue. In the context of the religious science perspective, which represents the ethical level of exploring a particular issue, I will look for the theoretical and conceptualisation tools of religious science as a social science that can be used to interpret the use of new technologies by the Church, especially when it comes to Internet social networking presentation. Th e basic objective of the article is, however, to present an overview of the presentation of the Catholic Church on Internet social networks in the Czech environment. It is impossible to achieve such a comprehensive goal within a single article, so I want to present this text as a fi rst step towards its fulfi lment. Th e sample which will be included in the overview must be fi rst more precisely defi ned. Talking about the internet social networks in the Czech environment, the most signifi cant share is that of the Facebook network, which, as shown by recent surveys, is signifi cantly dominant in terms of the number of users. According to the data published in the Focus agency research report, in September 2016 there was 42% of the adult population of the Czech Republic which had a Facebook social network profi le. 12 If one mentions the other platforms, including Google+, Youtube, or Instagram, there is a signifi cant gap between them and Facebook. Between 8% and 12% of the population have an account on those other platforms while 4% of the adult population had a Twitter account. 13  share within the Czech Republic for individual months in the range of 53-74%, while the shares of other social networks are around 10% this year. Th ere is a potential impact on up to 5,300,000 people if an advertising message is distributed through the Facebook social network in the Czech Republic (stated by Facebook itself in January 2018). 15 For these reasons, I will focus on the presentation of the Church through the Facebook social network. For comparison purposes, I am listing the number of follow-ups on some sites on the Twitter social network, which provides the offi cial presentation platform for the Holy See. Not only on Facebook itself, but on the Czech Internet in general, there are a lot of pages that can be found in some way related to the Church or to Catholicism, so it is necessary to defi ne more precisely the circle of the pages I will continue to deal with -an overview of the Church's presentation on this social network cannot be taken as complete. I will only focus on the social networking sites of Facebook, which are the offi cial communication and presentation platforms of the Church, its institutions, organs, and their representatives in the Czech Republic. Th e report includes pages that are open communication platforms and are not, for example, closed discussion groups. My work will be based on the organisational structure of ecclesiastical administration and, due to the limitation of the scope, I will focus on the Archbishopric and Bishopric, their representatives and the organs of the Church at this highest administrative level whose activities are primarily directed towards the Czech environment, respectively their activities are based on the Czech environment. Th ese also include the presentation of the Czech Bishops' Conference. 16 Into the overview, I also include a presentation of Catholic Weekly (Katolický týdeník), because it is the offi cial media platform of the Czech and Moravian Church provinces and undoubtedly an important communication medium of the Church, which is owned by ČBK and which has historical tradition. 17 I will not devote more attention to other ecclesiastical institutions and organisations, orders, vicariates, deaneries, parishes, or websites that are not directly incorporated into those Church institutions at the level of Archbishopric and Bishopric. I do not include, for example, the webpages of Caritas Czech Republic and its individual components (diocesan or parish charities) as it is a separate non-profi t organisation established by ČBK and is primarily active in the fi eld of social services. I will not focus on the pages of the Church leaders that are administered by their fans, or websites which parody these leaders or the Church institutions. 18 I will only deal with those webpages that are openly marked as the offi cial pages of the Church institutions and their representatives in the Czech Republic on Facebook or Twitter, or webpages which are linked to the offi cial web portals of the Church institutions and under which these webpages are organised. 19

Th e Church, the Internet, and Online Social Networks Today
What is the attitude of Holy See, as the highest ecclesiastical institution, towards the use of the Internet and online social networks, and what is the recent history of using new communication technologies and the Internet by the Church? We can say that, offi cially, the Holy See and its institutions are in favour of presenting themselves on the Internet and social networks. From the emic point of view (in the ecclesial environment itself), the use of the Internet can be combined with the concept of 'new evangelisation' . 20 Th e notion of 'new evangelisation' is not always used in a clearly unambiguous meaning -it may vary to a certain extent according to local conditions, 21 but its basic meaning is given (in the ecclesial environment) by the context of its origin. Th e very concept appears in connection with Pope Paul VI and his apostolic exhortation Evangelii nuntiandi issued in 1975, 22 where the pope writes about a 'new period of evangelization' 23 aft er the Second Vatican Council. John Paul II significantly develops this concept in his encyclical letter Redemptoris missio in 1990, 24 in which the term is clearly defi ned as the 're-evangelization' of those who 'have already received the mission of Christ' . 25 Th e new evangelisation refers in particular to countries with 'an ancient Christian tradition' , 26 where the faith is weakened, or people no longer feel to be members of the Church -in such cases, it is necessary to 're-evangelize' , 27 using also 'audiovisual means' 28   Twitter web page also serves the present pope Francis. Th e pope's offi cial Twitter profi le on English-language Twitter was viewed by more than 16 million users to the date 19 th January 2018. 44 Th e website has eight more language versions, including Latin, French, Arabic, or Polish. By the end of 2017, the pope's profi le pages, in all nine world languages, had more than 60 million followers on Twitter. 45 Th e offi cial Internet communication of the Church, which includes the offi cial communication via Internet social networks as well, is currently managed by the Communications Secretariat. Th e Secretariat is a curial offi ce, that is, a dicastery, which was created in the framework of the curial reform on the basis of the Apostolic Letter motu proprio by Pope Francis issued on 27 th June 2015. 46 Pope Francis notes that in the current age of digital media, the communication and information platforms of the Apostolic See need to be reorganised. 47 All offi cial Holy See media, therefore, are still managed by the newly created offi ce, and Article 3 of the Apostolic Letter directly assigns to the authority of the new offi ce the administration of the Pope's Twitter account '@pontifex' and the Vatican website www.vatican.va. 48 In addition to the 'papal' twitter account, the website Vatican News also provides the offi cial communication channel on the social network for the Holy See. Th is is the information system of the Vatican, which was created in connection with the Pope's reform of the communication platform organisation for the Holy See in 2015 49 and which spreads information through its own websites to online social networks. Besides websites in various language versions, Vatican News also runs pages on Facebook and Twitter. Th e Facebook page is run in English and (as of 19 th January 2018) has had over 3 million Facebook users view it. 50 Th e 'reposts' of tweets from the offi cial twitter page oft en appear here. Th e Twitter page of Vatican News, also in English, had 246,000 followers on the same date. 51 In the Czech ecclesial environment, among the highest representatives of the Church, one can fi nd both helpful and reserved attitudes towards the use of the Internet and online social networks.

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Despite a somewhat sceptical attitude, however, Cardinal Duka personally favours the usage of social networks -as witnessed, among other things, by the cardinal's own blog post 'Facebook Dialogue' in 2015 where Cardinal Duka presents his Facebook page as a forum for discussion about religion. 54 Th e main aim of the Facebook discussion, according to Duka, is: '(...) the majority of the population who does not speak about religion, even though it has an obvious relation to it (...). I will intentionally place the discussion on Facebook, a currently popular social network, which can be considered as a "continent" insuffi ciently explored by the churches' . 55 Th e webpages that informed in 2015 about Cardinal Duka's Facebook page (which is thought to be a platform for leading the dialogue on faith) included that of the Archbishopric of Prague. 56 Cardinal Duka conducts activity on this social network in order to use modern technologies as a way into a dialogue with the 'silent half of the nation' , 57 that is, those who, according to the 2011 census, did not comment on the issue of religious affi liation. 58 Cardinal Duka, in his blog post, uses the comparison given by Pope Benedict XVI (that is, the Internet as a continent). 59  ference. 64 In addition to sharing information about life inside the Church and about the attitudes of the Church and its representatives to events in the public sphere, the author mentions another important function of social networks. It is their use as tools of evangelisation. Th e author also quotes Josef Ptáček, who is presented as an information technology methodology specialist of the Prague Archbishopric. 65 Josef Ptáček states that Facebook can become an area for evangelisation in the form of a personal testimony of living faith and its meaning. 66 With regard to the quoted statements by representatives of the Catholic Church on the presentation of the Church on social networks, it can be said that this way of presentation has two basic functions in the emic sense, 67 which can be seen in mutual relation. Th e fi rst is informational (informing the public about the various activities of the Church and presenting the attitudes of the Church to current events and problems). Th e latter function can be described as evangelistic and pastoral in which new technologies and new media serve as a means of presenting and promoting the Christian (Catholic) worldview. It is clear that both of these functions cannot be separated from each other unambiguously. Th e information about the life of the Church is also understood (in the emic sense) as a testimony of living one's faith. 68 In the Czech ecclesial environment, the use of the Internet and social networks is also associated with new evangelisation, respectively re-evangelisation. Cardinal Dominik Duka speaks about this concept in connection with the use of new technologies, even though he is somehow cautious regarding using the Internet as a tool for spreading the Gospel. 69 In any case, the Internet and online social networks are (in an emic sense) perceived mainly as a means and space for spreading the gospel, 70 even though there are also calls for caution when using the Internet and online social networks. 71 An important context of the use of the Internet and online social networks by the Church (which results directly from the cited Church documents) is the focus on youth. In connection with the new evangelisation, offi cial papal documents talk about this 72 and the use of online social networks for evangelisation and pastoral work among the youth is also the subject of documents that can be found in the Czech ecclesial environment. 73 It is certainly not a surprising fi nding that the Church leaders' attitudes towards online social 8 2018 networks in the Czech environment correspond to the approach taken by the Holy See and its institutions to online social networks and the Internet. What is the present state of the presence of the Czech Catholic Church on social networks?

Presentation of the Church's Highest Institutions and Th eir Representatives on Social Networks
For clarity, I divide the webpages of the Czech Catholic Church on the social network Facebook into three groups. Th e fi rst is the websites of the Archbishopric and the Bishopric, while the second is the websites of the highest Church leaders at this level, the archbishops and bishops. In the third group I will list the other institutions of the Catholic Church at the level of Archbishopric and Bishopric and the ČBK, as well as the webpages of Catholic Weekly as the offi cial media platform of the Czech and Moravian Church provinces, according to the criteria described above. Facebook's dominant position among the Internet social networks in the Czech environment is confi rmed by the comparison of the webpages of individual Church institutions and representatives of the Catholic Church hierarchy on the Facebook and Twitter networks in terms of the number of users who follow these pages. I compare the Facebook webpages of ecclesiastical institutions with the Twitter accounts. Th e reason is the fact that Twitter is a platform which primarily carries out the presentation of the Holy See -here, one can fi nd the offi cial profi le webpage of the supreme ecclesiastical institution. On the Facebook social network, the impact of webpages on a network user can be derived from the two data that are usually available on each webpage -the number of users who tagged the page with the 'Like' option, and the number of users who tagged the webpage with the 'Follow' option. 74 Facebook's personal websites off er a possibility to become a 'friend' of a person who owns a page -although Facebook limits the number of friends so that users above this limit can only choose the 'Follow' option. Twitter shows the number of users who are following the webpage. An overview of the websites serving as the offi cial platforms of the Church on the online social networks in the Czech environment and the number of followers show that Facebook's social network is the main communication platform for the Church institutions and its representatives. Th e webpages of the highest ecclesiastical institutions and their representatives in both ecclesiastical provinces show the following overview tables, which (at the same time) include the number of followers, the 'Like' option and other basic information about these websites in January 2018 75 on the Facebook and Twitter social networking websites. 74 By selecting 'Like' on Facebook, the user supports the webpage and by that he can see its updates. Th e 'Follow' option means that the user can see the updates of such a labelled webpage, without even expressing his or her opinion about it. 75 Unless it is noted otherwise, the data about the number of followers or the tagging by selecting 'Like' in the tables and throughout the text when speaking about social networking websites is listed as of the date 19 th January 2018. All the webpages listed in the tables (as of the given date) met the criteria needed for inclusion in this report, although, in some cases, the numbers of followers and the 'Like' option are quoted at a later date.   Th e Czech Bishops' Conference, respectively its press centre, has a Facebook webpage that is linked to Církev.cz. 116 Although the Církev.cz website also contains a link to its own Twitter webpage, the Twitter webpage of this website did not exist on 19 th January 2018, and the link led to the Twitter profi le webpage of Stanislav Přibyl, General Secretary of ČBK whose profi le webpage is marked as personal. 117 Katolický týdeník, the offi cial periodical of the ČBK, has its own webpage on Facebook. 118 A special element is the web projects of the Pastoral Centre of the Archbishopric of Prague and their profi les on social networks. If one follows the Church's presence on social networks, the Pastoral Centre's projects have none similar (considering their conceptual structure and scope) in the Czech environment. 119 In terms of the number of Facebook users who follows the websites operated by the Pastoral Centre, Víra.cz 120 is the most popular. It is linked to the internet website of the same name. We can also fi nd the presentation of this website on Twitter, 121 but it has considerably fewer followers. Other webpages which are presented through Facebook and are run by the Pastoral Centre include the webpages Liturgie.cz, 122 Manželství krok za krokem -Manželství.cz, 123

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Modlitba.cz, 124 Pastorace.cz, 125 and Děti.Víra.cz. 126 All of these websites on Facebook are linked to internet websites with the same name. Similar websites focusing on youth work are run by relevant centres also in other dioceses, although they have fewer users compared to the webpages of the Prague Archdiocese. Data on the number of followers shows that the visibility of these websites is rather low. However, it is clear that institutions at the highest levels of ecclesiastical administration strive for a systematic presence on social networks. Th e absence of an offi cial presentation of the Archbishopric of Olomouc on social networks, though, suggests that the Catholic Church does not fully exploit the potential off ered by social networks. When giving the number of users, the most viewed webpage (at the level of archbishopric and bishopric) is that off ered by the Archbishopric of Prague. Organisational units of this archbishopric on Facebook also develop the most signifi cant activities among the mentioned ecclesiastical institutions. To have one's own profi le on social networks is less common among the supreme representatives of the Church (bishops and archbishops). In January 2018, the Czech Catholic Church (including the Apostolic Exarchate) had a total of 22 bishops, 127 along with the archbishops Cardinal Dominik Duka and Jan Graubner. Cardinal Dominik Duka's website, as an open offi cial personal profi le, can be regarded as the most important offi cial website associated with the highest institutions of ecclesiastical administration in the Czech Republic. From the thematic orientation of the webpages, it is clear that in addition to the webpages of the bishopric as institutions, there are webpages especially dedicated to the areas of evangelisation, pastoral care, and catechesis on social networks. Some of them are explicitly aimed at working with children and youth. 128

Th e Church and Online Social Media from the Point of View of Religious Science
From the point of view of religious science, understood as the social science study of religion in a socio-cultural context in a diachronic and synchronic perspective, 129 it is necessary to relate the question of the presentation of the Church on online social networks to specifi c socio-cultural contexts. However, the starting point is always the emic level of the issue, that is, in our case, the way in which the subject is interpreted within the Church itself. If we want to provide an ethical view -a view of objectivising science -on the subject under consideration, we must necessarily base it on the context in which it appears in the ecclesial environment itself. Th e issue of the Church using the Internet and the related use of online social networks are put into concrete context in religious documents, such as the aforementioned statement by Pope John Paul II in 2002, 130 in which the pope talks about cultural changes and changes in communication. Th ese bring the Church to a new threshold that needs to be crossed. 131 It can be said that the Church uses the internet in response to the changing socio-cultural situation. Using the language of the economic model of religion, 132 churches and religious societies are guided by the new marketing strategies on the 'religious market' 133 both globally and locally. In this context, the speech given by Pope John Paul II at the 36th World Media Day can be recalled. Th e pope compares the Internet to former forums of the ancient world, and recalls that these forums, as a place of social interaction in the widest perspective, served both as a marketplace and as a place of fulfi lment of religious duties. 134 Th e presence of the Church leaders and institutions on online social networks is therefore an example of the Church's attempt to respond to socio-cultural changes, accompanied, among other things, by changes in communication strategies, the expansion of the Internet and the associated new media (such as Internet social networks). Th e use of the Internet for evangelisation is also linked to the concept of new evangelisation, 135 in the ecclesial environment itself (understood as re-evangelisation where the population is diverted from a previously accepted faith). In religious science, the ethical perspective, therefore, the use of the Internet and online social networks by the Church can be interpreted in the context of secularisation in modern society. Secularisation is defi ned in older sociological literature as a situation in which religious thinking, practices, and institutions lose their social signifi cance. 136 Th is concept of secularisation, however, is today considered to be considerably simplifying and, in fact, is based on the ideology of the enlightenment-rationalist secularisation thesis, which simply expects the 'decline' of religion in modern societies. 137 Newer social science research abandons the ideologically tinged diction of the 'disappearance' or even 'decay' of religion and attempts to grasp the issue of secularisation as a sum of processes at diff erent levels of society and culture that (in the context of functional diff erentiation) accompany the transformation of the roles of religion in modern societies (respectively in some types of modern societies). 138 Th e theorist of secularisation Karel Dobbelaere distinguishes three basic levels in which diff erent processes of change can be observed in the context of secularisation while using diff erent theoretical and conceptualisation tools to describe and analyse them: individual, organisational, and societal. 139 Th ese levels, on which the secularisation processes can be examined, are not, of course, strictly separated. However, they theoretically allow us to grasp the complex matter of the changes that religion is undergoing in modern societies. At the individual level of secularisation, the degree of openly declared membership of a certain religious worldview (represented by a certain ecclesial community) is decreasing in society. Howev-er, we must not allow ourselves to come to the misleading conclusion that religion is disappearing in society. In connection with this, privatisation and individualisation of religion is taking place, the importance of religious 'bricolage' is growing at the individual level, 140 and religion becomes more of a private matter of individuals. 141 In a secularised society that shows a declining rate of declared religious affi liation to established churches and religious societies at an individual level, the Catholic Church must seek appropriate forms of spreading and keeping the religious worldview. Th e Internet and online social networks are an appropriate means and medium for this. Th erefore, they are referred to as a means and purpose of evangelistic and pastoral activity by the Church. Th e new evangelisation thus becomes, among other things, evangelisation through new technological means, 142 for example, with the use of new media. Such evangelisation can, of course, have an impact or manifests itself at more than one level: not only the individual, but also social and organisational. With regards to the rate of declared individual religious affi liation to churches and religious societies, Czech society can be considered highly secularised. 143 Today's Czech society is also characterised by frequent use of the Internet and online social networks. In the Czech environment, therefore, the use of social media to keep and spread the religious worldview at an individual level is (for the Church) a way of coping with the decreasing religious affi liation in relation to the individual level of secularisation processes. Changes in individual religious affi liation, however, are only one aspect of the issue of secularisation in modern societies -the low or declining rate of individually declared religious affi liation does not necessarily mean that religion is also largely disappearing from the public sphere. 144 At the societal level, established religious views and churches can maintain a signifi cant degree of presence in the public sphere, for example, when religion-related topics are the subject of debate in the public space. For instance, this is when these topics enter the political area. Th is may happen when religious themes are combined with the concepts of national history or national identity and patriotism (taking into account particular historical circumstances). Examples of such phenomena in the Czech environment include the St. Wenceslas legend, the Cyrillo-Methodian tradition, or the tradition of the Hussite Reformation. 145 It is not only for this reason that we can fi nd a number of examples where the themes associated with the Church appear in the public space -the statements of ecclesiastical representatives on various events are discussed, 146 the presence of state offi cials at Church events is refl ected upon, 147 ecclesiastical representatives par-ticipate in state events, 148 etc. In connection with the societal level of secularisation and the entry of religious themes into the public space, social internet networks can become part of the process of establishing the Church agenda. 149 Th e online networks operated by the Church can become a platform for public discussion on topics that are important to the Church. Th e role of the new media belonging to Internet social networks are becoming the subject of a keen interest of a number of researchers. 150 Although there is no consensus among scholars, for example, on the extent to which Internet social networks themselves aff ect the processes of public agenda establishing and how they disrupt existing models of agenda establishing through classical or traditional media, 151 some research confi rms the importance of Internet social networks for spreading topics in public space. 152 Th e Church uses the Internet in at least two basic types or areas of agenda establishing: media and public. Th e Church's web platforms, including social networking websites, are used by the Church as a source of information for journalists as a representative of the classical media that can further promote the themes presented by the Church. 153 Th e Church also uses the web platform as a means of spreading the public agenda associated with a number of topics that are important to the Church. 154 Even a simple overview of the offi cial social networks of the Czech Catholic Church shows that one of these is, for example, the area of marriage (respectively family policies), which is directly addressed by one of the thematically-specialised Facebook websites. Online social networks, in connection with both individual and societal levels, can also become a means of establishing, maintaining, or spreading religious memory. 155 Collective memory, including religious memory, can be understood as a social construct that arises from the interaction of social network elements, that is, between communicating individuals and their groups. 156 From this point of view, there is an obvious connection between social media and religious memory as a collective memory. 157 Technological developments in Internet social networks lead some re-searchers to overcome the classical concept of collective memory that is shaped, maintained, and spread between individuals and their groups: in social networking, it is spoken more as 'connective memory' , where digital technology does not serve as a mere medium or memory spreading medium. It serves rather as a 'connective memory' which is formed and structured in a complex interaction of human and technological factors. 158 For the Church, online social networks are the ideal means of entering this Internet environment in which connective memory is formed, maintained, and spread. Karel Dobbelaere speaks about the third level or area of secularisation which is the organisational level: in the context of socio-cultural changes linked to the structural and functional diff erentiation in modern societies, the churches themselves have to change and adapt as organisations. Th is changes not only their organisational structure but also doctrinal principles. 159 Th e use of the Internet and online social networks in this sense is accompanied by changes in the Church that can be observed at all levels of the Church administration. Th e papal Curia is undergoing organisational changes that allow it to manage the fi eld of communication more eff ectively. Th is includes the use of the Internet and social networks where new offi cial Church platforms are being created. At the same time, ecclesiastical authorities issue documents that put this area into doctrinal contexts -these are documents of various types, from papal letters to documents issued by relevant curial authorities and their representatives. Organisational changes related to the use of the Internet and online social networks also manifest themselves at lower levels of ecclesiastical administration, for example, there are special departments with employees who are in charge of this area of communication at the bishoprics and archbishoprics. 160

Conclusion
Th e Czech Catholic Church is represented at the highest levels of ecclesiastical administration on social networks by the offi cial webpages of all bishoprics and the Archbishopric of Prague. Only the Olomouc Archbishopric does not have an offi cial social networking website. Th e activities of the Archbishopric of Prague, especially of its Pastoral Centre, are signifi cant in comparison with the activities of other bishoprics on social networks and are diversifi ed in thematic focus. In terms of thematic focus, these webpages focus on youth work, evangelisation, and pastoral work, especially in connection with topics that are important to the Church -for example, in connection with the subject of marriage. Th e representation of senior clergy on social networks is rare. On the whole, the ratings of offi cial Church websites are rather lower. It can be assumed that online social networks represent a space not fully utilised for the Czech Catholic Church. Nevertheless, the Church is attempting to systematically penetrate this space as evidenced, for example, by the activities of the Archbishopric of Prague. From an emic point of view, the Church declares two basic functions of web presentations and presentations on social networks. Th e informational function is characterised by informing the public about the various activities of the Church and by presenting the attitudes of the Church to current events and problems. Evangelistic and pastoral functions are characterised by the use of social media as a means of presenting and promoting the Christian (Catholic) worldview. One can meet the opinion that the Internet and social networks are not just a tool but also the very purpose of evangelistic activity. At this level, the use of social networks is related to the concept of new evangelisation, which is understood not only in the classical meaning of re-evangelisation but also as evangelisation with the usage of new technological means. In an ethical perspective, from the point of view of religious science, the use of online social networks can be brought into connection with the concept of secularisation. From the conceptual point of view, this issue should be divided into three basic levels: individual, societal, and organisational, without the individual components of the secularisation processes at these levels being described and analysed as mutually unrelated. At the individual level, social networks (for the Church) are a means and environment in which the Church can carry out the spread of the religious worldview in the broadest context. Th e use of new communication platforms joined by individuals -members of online social networks -becomes a way for the Church to cope with secularisation on an individual level, and is the reaction of the Church to the processes of the privatisation and individualisation of religion. At the societal level, the Church engages in social networks in agenda-building processes, especially at the media and social public levels. At the same time, social networks are (for the Church) a means of creating, maintaining, and spreading religious memory in a specifi c form of 'connective memory' associated with online social networks, which can apply to both the social and the individual level of secularisation. Finally, at the organisational level, the Church does not adapt only its own organisational structure to the changing socio-cultural situation but, along with new ways of communicating and spreading information through new technologies, it also adapts its doctrinal area. Th e basic purpose of this study is not the defi nitive evaluation of the theme of the Church presentation on the Internet and social networks. Th e conclusions brought by this study are in many ways only a hint of the direction of further research or the impetus for potential critical reassessment. It can be assumed that in the future presentations through the Internet and online social networks will be of increasing importance to public offi cials including the Catholic Church and its representatives. It is a stimulating topic for social sciences that will undoubtedly require new approaches, both theoretical and methodological.