Living Catholicism

What is the Catholic Carnival?
Blog Carnivals have been around for several years now - almost as long as blogs. In simple terms, they are a collection of blog posts from various bloggers and often from different points of view on a specific topic.

The Christian Carnival had been around a while and a blogger, Eric at Ales Rarus suggested that someone create a specific "Catholic Carnival" (I believe he didn't have the time to do it himself at that point). I jumped in and agreed to start it up. Thus, the Catholic Carnival was born. The first Catholic Carnival was posted October 26, 2004 and it has been posted every week since.

Each week the Catholic Carnival includes a varying number of Catholic posts from throughout the blogosphere. Any Catholic blogger can submit a post and the only real rule is that it cannot contradict Catholic doctrine. So far that rule has been enough to keep it as a high-quality location to find interesting Catholic thought on a weekly basis. Each Tuesday the Carnival is posted at a specific blog. You can find out where it's at either at my Catholic Carnival section or at the Catholic Carnival page of Blog Carnival (which lists many, many blog Carnivals).

How can I participate?
If you are not a blogger, the best way is to take the time to checkout the Catholic Carnival on a weekly basis. Each week is full of interesting Catholic thought on a myriad of subjects. You are sure to find something of interest that will engage your mind or challenge your spiritual growth.

If you are a blogger, then you can submit a post each week. Join the Catholic Carnival Google Group and you'll receive a weekly notice detailing the where, when, how, and who of entering the Carnival that week. In addition, you'll receive an email once the Carnival is posted, so that you can link to it from your blog (this is very important, so that others can enjoy the Carnival as well). To
enter is easy, just email the information below each week to the appropriate person (listed in the email):

Your Blog's name
Your Blog's URL (address)
Post name of the article you choose
Post URL of the chosen article (Permalink)
A short description of your article (just a sentence or two)

The benefit to you is that you gain new Catholic readers (who find you through the Carnival), you get to highlight a special post others may have missed, and you gain exposure to people and search engine crawlers through the Carnivals (it's good to participate!).

Another way to participate is by hosting the Catholic Carnival one week on your blog. The host agrees to gather up the posts for that week and put them together as a post on his/her blog on the Tuesday that the Carnival is held. It does involve some work, since you have to sift through the entries and pull them together, but it is enjoyable to host. And you receive visitors who come checkout the Carnival and get introduced to your blog. If you're interested in hosting, email me with any questions or dates you would be open to hosting (pick a couple, so that if someone already has the date I can move to your second choice).

Also, please add the Catholic Carnival chicklet to your website:



It's a great way to support the Carnival. Please point the chicklet to our main Catholic Carnival page so visitors can see the latest Carnival. Thanks to Owen at Luminous Miseries and VERT for creating this!

What's the Point?
I probably should have covered this early, but there is a good point as to why we do the Catholic Carnival. Research has suggested that just a small percentage of websites receive virtually all of the web traffic (it makes the 80/20 rule look like a perfect world). The Catholic Carnival allows Catholics to find interesting websites on religious topics that would be virtually impossible for them to find in other ways. In other words, the Carnival helps expose Catholics online sharing their faith to an audience that would have trouble finding them.

We believe truly in the Catholic faith and believe strongly that it should be taken to all of the world. This is one little way to help bring our faith to Catholics and non-Catholics who are on the internet.

So, please participate. The more Catholic bloggers we can get involved, the better each individual Catholic Carnival will be. And the more enjoyable reading each Carnival will be.

Over time I'll update this page with new information. If you notice anything I've missed, just post it below and I'll add it!

God bless,
Jay