So much has been written about the impact of social media from a Christian perspective that it’s hard to imagine how anyone could contribute anything new. But my friend Arthur Kay, Minister at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Bolton, Lancashire, UK, made some remarkably profound and insightful comments in a recent email exchange with a few friends. Here, with his kind permission (thanks Arthur), are some reflections prompted by what he said, including some large chunks straight from his pen (of course, I’m to blame for anything that’s inaccurate, irritating or confusing):
People today have fewer and fewer reasons for getting together. Many of the things in the ancient world that reinforced tradition and kept people together geographically are gone. Travel is much easier; we no longer need to go to the local market to exchange goods; many cultural and social festivals are disappearing.
But even today the constraints by which cities have arisen in the past are being stripped away. Technology is enabling more and more personal isolation. For example, consider the impact of:
- Instant remote communication
- Remote diagnosis and even remote surgery
- Online shopping and drone deliveries
- Online multi-player games
- Working from home
- Virtual meetings
- 3D printing
- Superb all-round sound and vision reproduction over vast distances so that it is no longer worth the hassle of attending concerts and art-galleries
What all this means is that human selfishness is easier than ever to indulge. Human community does not arise “naturally”; it must be formed deliberately, and it takes a considerably effort to do so.
This prompts some interesting thoughts about what the local church community will look like in the future. Assuming that we don’t capitulate to the virtual church movement (Lord preserve us), perhaps God is bringing us to a point where pretty much ther only communities around are those gathered around the Lord’s Table. Though our cities may be larger than ever before, there may come a time when there might simply be very few actual localised, embodied communities left.
Perhaps God is handing us over to the consequences of our individualism, giving the world in an extreme form what we’ve been foolishly been seeking for many years, and daring the church to stand against the cultural tide. Churches that have the courage to do this may find that they suddenly become havens for large numbers of fragile, splintered people who have been stripped bare by the folly of (post-)modern, post-romantic individualism and are desperate for a community that will hold them together.
