Participação da Pastoral da Comunicação (Pascom) em processos midiáticos da Igreja Católica: práticas comunitárias da Rede de Comunicadores da Arquidiocese de Natal (Recan) - RN

Abstract

The communication processes of the Catholic Church follow diverse and multidirectional flows, with the participation of various actors. Among these, in Brazil, the Institution relies on agents of the Pastoral da Comunicação (Pastoral Communication), who volunteer in parishes and communities, carrying out actions of dissemination and community integration. The action of Pastoral Communication is based on ecclesiastical documents, studies on communication, and social practices developed in the community environment, based on four axes: spirituality, education, articulation, and production (CNBB, 2023). This research seeks to explain how the participation of agents of Pastoral Communication, networked, occurs in the media communication of the Catholic Church, from a community perspective, considering the contemporary communication context, ecclesiastical guidelines, and the motivations of these agents to contribute to these processes. This study reflects on concepts related to community communication and participation in networked media processes by social movements, specifically within the Catholic Church. The research is qualitative and is carried out through a case study (Yin, 2005), addressing the participation of agents of Pastoral Communication in the media processes coordinated by the Social Communication Sector and the Communicators Network of the Archdiocese of Natal (Recan). The theoretical-methodological basis of this research includes reflections on community communication (Paiva, 2003; 2007; Peruzzo, 2009; Miani, 2011), participation (Bordenave, 1994; Peruzzo, 2007; Carpentier, 2018), media and religion (Martino, 2016), and interfaces with Catholicism (Puntel, 2010; Alvarenga, 2016; Sbardelotto, 2017; and Zanon, 2021). In addition to literature review and research, documentary research techniques, systematic observation, questionnaire application, interviews, and analysis of media products are used. It was found that agents of Pastoral Communication participate in the media processes of the Archdiocese of Natal at the levels of reception, messages, production, and content planning. It was concluded that Pastoral Communication is strategic for the integration between the practices of community and institutional communication in the Catholic ecclesial context, and that Pascom's pastoral practices can contribute to the integration of the Institution with media culture. A model of a network of communicators for a particular Church was also proposed, based on (arch)diocesan and parish instances, which collaborate with institutional media production and circulation and which includes five essential subjects or groups of subjects: the network articulator, the institutional communication team, the parish teams of Pastoral Communication, the parish coordinator of Pastoral Communication, and the other subjects of the respective instances.