The www.Dieu.net Project
		Summary This paper presents the Dieu.net project. Many practicing Christians have worked together to construe it. Our dream is for Dieu.net to be a liturgical and catechetic library to be consulted over the web. This library is to contain readings, music, songs, hymns, poems, Sunday biblical readings and examples of interpretation of these readings. Everything is to be indexed so that access is simple and clear. Present situation and history Since 1971, we have taken an active interest in liturgy and youth groups: first in London, UK, in the Marist parish of Notre Dame de France; then in Lille, France, at Notre Dame de Consolation with Jean Lebon; in Bourg la Reine near Paris; in Eguilles, Provence; in Montreal, Quebec, in the Saint Albert le Grand Community and recently in Joseph Gelineau's Ecuelles parish in France. We were able to meet many different people in these very different parishes. Our experience with teenagers and our involvement in various kinds of liturgies has led us to appreciate the value of a future Christian Resource web site. Time taken in photocopying texts, music or drawings (scanned/photocopied) for hymn sheets, parish newspapers or liturgical support is enormous. An additional problem we meet regularly is the lack of time to tidy material after use for meetings and liturgies. To find them again amidst a pile of unclassified documents is difficult and time consuming. Time spent on these jobs is not spent evangelizing. Of this experience came the idea to have a library of documents and music. Dieu.net would be such a library, a well indexed place of resource where texts, hymns and art work are found quickly and can be printed then used as required. Why choose the internet? We have come up with various ideas over the years to deliver such a service and to be able to earn an income to cover the costs. In 1995, we thought of using CD-ROM but this rigid media did not allow regular updating. We therefore decided in 1996 to create an internet support. For legal reasons it was not possible to establish an E commerce solution (with credit card transactions) in France so we moved our company back to Canada this time in Vancouver. The web allows easy access to data files. For a library, this is the cheapest media available. Once the data entered and indexed, there is nothing left to modify: no additional classification, no special care of material. The only documents printed by the user are those useful for a particular project. The internet allows for world sharing of the same materials, physical distance is no longer an issue. Dieu.net objectives The Dieu.net project is at the heart of pastoral and catechetical centers. It will become little by little a place of research where every lay or ordained Christian can come at any time to consult documents, readings, art work, music or hymns. Dieu.net is a well indexed data base to be utilized by people with minimal computer experience. It is an extra tool we have, complementary to already existing subscription parish publications. Insertion into documents (song sheets, retreat booklet, parish news sheet and printing onto paper will be automatically carried out. The index is our primer commitment. As in a library, one has to find easily and quickly what one is looking for. Key words, names of persons, biblical chapter and verse will all be research tools for bible readings. A document will be classified by author, theme, liturgical time of the year, passage title; Music by author, chorus, first line and also by musical genre, difficulty of execution and by musical phrase with audio possibilities. A good index is the first key to success. We are next committed to having a whole range of participants. It is obvious that one cannot build regular liturgies or prepare educational documents with only one artist, one author and one musician. The needs of our churches are too varied. Our third commitment is to link Dieu.net with other Christian sites with the wish to become ecumenical even if the core of our site has the characteristics of a Roman Catholic site. Enfin, nous désirons que le site Dieu.net soit financièrement indépendant tout en restant une entreprise à but non lucratif. Creation of the Dieu.net service To build such a site we need texts, art work, hymns and songs. For art work both Seán O'Brien and Bruno Rabourdin have accepted to share their talents with us through this web site. Father Joseph Gelineau, a composer is very interested in participating in the project. This is however not sufficient to build a library. We need more variety. This is where liturgical pastoral Centers can be a help us have access to Sunday biblical readings and hymns. Exemple d’insertion de musique dans un texte à partir du site Dieu.net: Joseph Gelineau 1998 Added on to the library we could also use the site to post conferences and educational seminars. We could build a chat room for discussions over the internet if such an interest was confirmed. Building Dieu.net The more varied is Dieu.net's data base, the better tool it will be. The more complete it is, the more it will serve church leaders. Growth and expansion has to be ambitious. In view of our experience, it would seem to us that it is necessary to index every year 500 drawings, 2000 hymns or pieces of music and 2000 texts. Indexing and formatting takes 20 minutes an item. So as to index 4500 items per year, three full time persons and one part time manager are required. Conclusion We leave you with our dream. Already this new site is in construction. We look forward to hearing from you. And a finishing word on the missed Y2K bug.

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