Stokes Sounds Off: Clarifying the intent of my responses to comments on this blog

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Wednesday, November 8, 2017

Clarifying the intent of my responses to comments on this blog

Hello again, everyone! I wanted to post again at this time, as the title of this post says, to clarify the intent of my responses to comments on this blog. I always value feedback from others. When I hear comments and thoughts from other people about things that I have "sounded off" about, I have, more often than not, posted personal replies to each of those comments. I am concerned that some might have felt my doing so is meant to end the chance for discussion of such topics.

Nothing could be further from the truth. I am happy to welcome any and all comments from anyone on any post at any time any of you do want to comment. I know some people who blog regularly that have, to a certain degree, let their comment boards run themselves, only responding if and when questions are directed to them personally. And I respect that as their right. But in my case, my intention in responding to each comment that, in my opinion, deserves a reply, as I have done up to now (and will continue to do, if that's okay with all of you), is to acknowledge the merits (and when needed, correction and clarification) in the comments each of you make, and I hope that by doing so, each one of you to whom I do respond will understand clearly how much I value all comments on this blog.

Rather than ending the conversation, I hope that such replies will provide more of an opportunity for the discussion to continue in an orderly manner, and will be a clear indicator of how much I appreciate all of you who do comment. That has always been my only intent for commenting as extensively as I have here on my own blog. I hope any I may have offended by so doing will forgive me. In the meantime, I also hope that the conversations on here, to whatever extent my personal replies may be involved, will continue to be inspiring for all who follow them. I have been humbled to my very core to realize how many regular readers I have gained, and to see how readership of this blog has expanded to various parts of the world. The fact that my thoughts, as imperfect as I myself am, are of interest to so many means everything in the world to me.

That seems like a good note to end on. That does it for this post. Any comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. Thank you for the privilege of your time. Until my next post, I wish each one of you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless each one of you in all that you do.

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In addition to my life-long love for the subjects which I cover in the posts of this blog, I have long held the belief that we can disagree without becoming disagreeable. Differences of opinion are natural, while being disagreeable in expressing those differences is not. And in that sense, I have no desire to close the door on anyone who earnestly desires to contribute to the ongoing dialogue on subjects covered in the posts on this blog.

At the same time, however, I recognize that we live in a time when incivility, discourtesy, unkindness, and even cyber-bullying has regrettably become part of online interactions. With that in mind, while anyone who wishes can comment on anything if they choose to do so, I hereby reserve the right to immediately delete any comments which are critical, unkind, lack civility, or promote prodcuts, services, and values contrary to either the Church, or to the rules of online etiquette.

I'd also like to remind all who comment here that I try to respond personally to each individual comment as I feel is appropriate. Such replies are not meant to end the conversation, but to acknowledge earnest feedback as it is submitted.

And in order to better preserve the spirit and pure intentions for which this blog was established, I also hereby request that anyone not commenting with a regular user name (particularly those whose comments appear under the "Unknown" or "Anonymous" monikers, give the rest of us a name to work with in addressing any replies. If such individuals do not wish to disclose their actual given names, a pseudonym or nickname would suffice.

Any comments made by individuals who opt to not give a name by which they can ber identified may, depending on the substance and tone of such comments, be subject to deletion as well. I would respectfully ask that all of us do all we can to keep the dialogue positive, polite, and without malice or ill-will. May the Lord bless us all in our discussion of these important matters.