New Links List: Catholic, Local and Online

One of the trickiest aspects of being a “local” Catholic blogger for a diocesan Catholic newspaper, The Catholic Post, but writing about books, which are generally not specific to the diocese, is balancing the local and more general audiences.   I’ve wondered, and had a few discussions with my editor, about ways to make the blog more local-friendly or help it have a local “flavor” at the same time.  I’ve added a new links list to help with that.

If you look on the right hand panel of this blog, you’ll see a new links list: “Catholic, Local, and Online”

For some reason, this idea never occurred to me before now, but now I’m very excited to share and compile local Catholic online sources.  You’ll notice I have everything from the Catholic Diocese of Peoria to various bloggers and other local-interest sites.

I made the list relatively local–not just people from our diocese, but those nearby.  I considered Sister Helena Burns and her blog “Hell Burns” in this “local” category, since she is such a friend of the Peoria diocese, speaks here often, and is just a short drive away in Chicago.  I’m really thinking of expanding to include St. Louis people as well, since there are quite a few Catholic folks active online there.  I also couldn’t resist adding Lisa Schmidt, who blogs with her husband at The Practicing Catholic, since they are just in the next state over.

I have a number of requests out to local Peoria-area bloggers that I know locally to see if they would like to be added onto the list.  I’m really on the look-out for anyone who is active online with a blog, Twitter presence or other online resource.  Can you share your favorites?  And if you would like to be added onto the list, or have an idea for someone to add (even if not “strictly” local), then please comment on this post and I would love to add you onto this.

Eventually, I might consider making this a tab on the top of the blog.  If you have any ideas on that, please share away!