Radosław Sierocki

The online petitions to the hierarchy and leaders of the Catholic Church. Discourses of protest and practices of mobilization

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The analysis of the online petitions addressing the hierarchy and leaders of the Catholic Church is interesting in the context of the digital religion research perspective for several reasons, which I present in the form of hypotheses. These relate to the Polish context. Firstly, the online petitions are created and signed online. They are accessible (if made public) and easy to share, therefore they reveal or form more or less extensive and durable social networks mediated by online networks. Secondly, they manifest the “civic engagement” of church members who, concerned about certain values, address their petitions, complaints and protests to church officials. They are also a manifestation of the politicisation of religion, which is related to the third point – petitions show not only networks and values but also groups of interest operating within the community of the Church. They do not show the commitment of the whole Church, of all the faithful, but have the potential to mobilise in the name of specific issues (interests, values). Fourthly, the content of the petitions and the comments that appear on social media create a kind of protest discourse. Fifthly, although they do not show the actions and involvement of the hierarchs themselves, they build up an image of them as actors with the power to solve specific problems. The paper aims to analyse petitions created and shared by online platforms (petitionsonline.com, avaaz.org, change.org) through the lens of the discourse of protest and grievance, sometimes conflict, and in the context of engagement and social mobilisation using digital tools.