Director Serena Sartini Tells How the Site Started
ROME, SEPT. 23, 2003 (Zenit.org).- World Youth Days have promoted conversions and vocations. They have also triggered high-tech initiatives in the new evangelization.
A case in point is www.korazym.org. This Web page, set up by a group of youths who participated in Toronto's World Youth Day last year, has become a point of reference for the WYD in Cologne, Germany, scheduled for August 2005.
To better understand this initiative, ZENIT interviewed Serena Sartini, the director, a young media professional from Arezzo, Italy.
Q: How did www.korazym.org come into being?
Sartini: It started with a group of friends united by Franciscan spirituality - we belong to the Franciscan movement - to offer a forum for discussion, to inform young people on events in the Pope's life and on WYD. These are our pillars; with them we want to create a place of encounter. We began on April 12, 2003, the Youth Day in the Diocese of Rome.
Q: Where did you get the name «Korazym»?
Sartini: It refers to the Hebrew name of the mount of the beatitudes in the Holy Land. In fact, we have changed the writing. Instead of the «i» we have used «y,» as in «youth» - a gesture which seeks to open the heart to all young people.
Q: What is your objective?
Sartini: We want to give real, true information despite that fact we are just starting in the journalistic experience, guided by serious journalistic criteria. We want it to be a press instrument that offers a Christian view of the world.
We think that Internet is not only one of the most powerful means of communication but also of formation. We try to follow the Pope, who is our guide, and who has asked us to evangelize. Where the Gospel is known, its presence must be reinforced. Where it is unknown, we must help to make it present.
Q: How many people make www.korazym.org possible?
Sartini: We began with a team that was spread all over Italy. Now we are involving other young people, also from abroad. The essential nucleus is made up of five youths, while we have some 10 established collaborators. A young man, expert in information technology, is in charge of the technical part. He has turned his work into a mission of evangelization. Young people from several countries have been in touch with us, as they want to collaborate.
Q: What is www.korazym.org offering right now?
Sartini: In the first months we have given extensive coverage not only with articles but also with photos and videos, of the visits undertaken in these months by John Paul II to several countries of Europe as well as, for example, the meeting of religious leaders held in Aachen.
The page offers daily a large quantity of news of the Church and the world, divided in five key sections. All this enormous quantity of information is supplemented with forums and surveys, as we also wish to give space to interpersonal encounters with users.
ZENIT Daily dispatch - The World Seen from Rome
12. november 2003