Katie. It is my neighbour, Dr Rachil Schper, anaesthetist, Holocaust survivor, Jew. She is Polish, and her accent is still very heavy after 30 years in New York. I am 14 years old.

'Katie, tell me please. If you are having an argument with God and an argument with your neighbour, which argument should you solve first?'

'I think. This is easy. I am an innately religious child. The argument with God, of course,' I reply, triumphantly.

Dr Schper has run into kids like me before. She beams. 'No, no, no,' she says. 'God will always understand and forgive you. With God, there is always time. On the other hand, your neighbour, that might not be so easy to solve. You must always solve the problem with your neighbour before the problem with God. God will always wait.'

Thus, I learned how to be religious partly from her: God was an intimate, so intimate you could have a row and put off fixing it, confident that God would not abandon you. God was the one with whom you could discuss, debate, analyse and conjecture. God gave you your reason and your conscience and expected you to use it. God is exactly the Father figure Jesus describes.

Based on this image of God, I arrived at a view of religious journalism. Like every other journalist, the religious journalist seeks to find things out and to compare such findings with truth expressed in a particular tradition.

Online Catholics was the initiative of John Menadue AO, former chief of staff to Prime Ministers Whitlam and Fraser and former Ambassador to Japan. A convert, Mr Menadue was a key player in forming Catalyst for Renewal and its thriving offshoot, Spirituality in the Pub. However Mr Menadue saw a further need for an independent, forthright voice that could explore and express hope in a new way. That was the vision of Online Catholics.

What we had not planned was the response. From all over the country, Catholics sought out other Catholics who shared the spirit of Vatican II. All of a sudden phrases such as 'the full and active participation of the laity' could be uttered anew. Conscience, women's role, transparency and accountability in the Church are all keenly debated in our little bit of cyberspace. Online Catholics has been in business for one year and has one tenth of the subscribers of the prestigious UK Tablet, (established in 1840, also by a convert) with one twentieth of its staff. We have readers in the US, New Zealand, the UK, Belgium, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Indonesia, Canada, Fiji, the Netherlands, Guatemala, Ireland, Switzerland, Singapore, Thailand, Peru, Germany, Philippines, Zambia, France, Brazil, Poland and South Africa.

And that's the real point: this technology enables the public discourse. It democratises it and sends it all the way around the world. The internet is wonderfully Catholic, that is, universal in its application. Anyone with a computer and an internet connection can be in the conversation.

Fr Edmund Campion once reminded me that the excessive influence of Rome was entirely linked to modern communications. Before radio, information about the Australian church took at least three months to reach the Vatican and another three months for a Vatican fiat to return. Later, instantaneous news meant the eagle eye of Rome could be everywhere. The currently overblown papacy (thoroughly out of keeping with Catholic tradition) is the result.

But the Spirit moves where it will. Technology has again created a whole new environment. I am anxious that my little ones will not have the opportunity to know the faith that I had. There is so much conflict and unhappiness in the Church today, so little spirit of mutual obligation.

Perhaps that is the lesson taught by my Jewish neighbour. Connect up with everyone, especially those with whom you are in conflict, as your first task. How thoughtful - and sort of extravagant! - of God to deliver to us this magical means of connecting to the world.

Kate Mannix, editor of Online Catholics, is a former researcher and producer for ABC Television. She edited the ecumenical monthly National Outlook, was a NSW CCJ board member for eight years, briefly masqueraded as a teacher of religious education and edited the Caritas online newsletter, Ozspirit and Pray.com for Church Resources. Kate is married to George Mannix. They have four children.