EDITORIAL - Don't forward

Hardly a day passes in this cyber age that a person doesn't find in his inbox a forwarded message containing a "prayer" or similar religion-oriented story or composition that he or she is supposed to forward to as many other people as he or she can.

It would have been easy to do the bidding of the forwarding party by also forwarding the message to other hapless recepients if one could get around to believing the authenticity and sincerity of the message.

But the message invariably carries either a caveat about the message not having been broken and woe unto the person who breaks it, or an enticement as in something you wish for will be yours the morning after you forward the message to 4,768 other people.

In other words, you have just been made a sucker by people who simply have too much time in their hands. These messages are nothing more than a latter day cousin of the pre-computer age chain letter.

God does not work in this manner, and faith does not require such obvert displays of blind madness and unrestrained stupidity. When God resides in the heart, life is full and there is no room left for unfulfilled wishes.

That there are people who find fulfillment in creating cyber chain messages, complete with religious messages, and enjoyment in seeing their creations zip dizzyingly around the world many times over in milliseconds, is something we can do nothing about.

What is mystifying is why nobody from the Roman Catholic Church, which indirectly is being made to look foolish as a result of such blasphemous gimmickry, appears willing to make a stand against the practice.

Does the silence of the Church mean tolerance? Is it allowing the taking in vain of the name of the Lord Our God? Do poor Jesus Christ and the Blessed Virgin Mary even know their sacred images are being used to force unsuspecting online readers into forwarding the messages?

The messages are good. There is no denying that. By themselves, they are truly worth sending to millions around the world. But when there is an implied threat of fire and brimstone raining on your head if you don't, you know right away it is not God talking.