This is surprising, to say the least:

A poll of U.S. Catholics indicates that while only 5 per cent of respondents said they read or follow blogs on the Catholic Church, faith, or spirituality, 33 per cent of those surveyed said they would like their pastor to have a blog.

To be more precise, the 5 per cent bit doesn’t surprise me. My own blog consumption ebbs and flows, and I can go weeks without reading blogs — much less blogging myself.

But the 33 per cent bit surprises me a lot. I wonder where the other two thirds of respondents sit? There must be a sizeable minority who think it’s a contemptible waste of time — a group I sometimes identify with myself. There are many ways to exercise the apostolate, and blogging isn’t at the top of my list.

Still, I’ll perservere. When I’ve got something interesting to ponder, I like blogging. But long gone is the naive resolution to post daily, or at least several times a week, just for the sake of maintaining an audience. That’s not a good use of time — for me, or for readers. The Oatmeal (a web cartoonist) makes a good point about this:

In fact, the Oatmeal’s entire post about writing for the web is worth reading. His observations about web-based feedback is spot on. Here he explains why he disables comments on his blog posts:

Read the whole comic — more of a cartoon essay, really. It contains crude language, but it’s full of good insights, and it will make you laugh.