A Leaven In The World . . . Social Networks, Virtual Reality, And Trinitarian Love
By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
The omnipresent cell phone is blamed as often as it is praised. We like our cell phones for the convenience of reaching out to others by voice or text whenever we like as well as surfing the Internet and obtaining information and directions whenever we need them. Electronic devices of all kinds have become a welcome addition to our lives as we accomplish various tasks at work and at home.
But, perhaps just as often, cell phones are blamed for the downside that comes with their ubiquity. We often hear stories of families together only in a physical sense for dinner or other occasions as one or more members pull out their cell phones to text or check email, Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram for extended periods, mixed with intermittent returns to brief jabs of conversation.
Available and real versions of the relationships we purportedly seek through virtual reality are rejected in favor of poor imitations, consigning the consumer to ultimate frustration. Although many tasks can be managed two at a time, this is not true of people: Attention divided between devices like cell phones and other people does not qualify as sincere presence.
Why does the virtual reality of the experience of being observed living life, as confirmed by “Likes” on Facebook posts or “Favorites” and “Retweets” on Twitter, seem so often to be prized above the immediate presence of a family member or friend seated across the table from us in the attempt to share a meal, or in the same room for a visit?
Often photos are taken in anticipation of posting them online, to the neglect of dwelling in the moment for the sake of the experience itself. In fact, because of the overwhelming presence of cell phones and other electronic devices, one’s willingness to leave these in the car during dinner is now a measure of one’s sincere desire to be present without distractions for the sake of one’s meal companions or coworkers.
How did we get to this point and what is really going on? I think that this phenomenon points to our divine origin and our need to consciously move toward our divine goal. We innately sense that we have been created in His image by our trinitarian God and that our lives must for that reason be located within a communion of God and others in order for us to sense that we are securely engaged on a spiritual path as a foretaste of Heaven.
Why do we seek tangible evidence that our cherished moments and prized experiences are observed and appreciated? Followers on Facebook and their favorable reactions to our photos and stories answer a need deep within us which confirms our spiritual nature: We need to know we are loved and seen by Another, affirmed by the greatest source of affirmation, God, who indeed “likes” us, and that all the beloved people and circumstances in our lives are confirmed and valued within the love of His goodness and consciousness.
Our relationship with God, whether consciously acknowledged in prayer and a life of worship or unconsciously experienced by a need for recognition on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, is the one within which all other relationships exist. In Him “we live and move and have our being.”
Our innate need to experience being “observed in relation” springs from our very nature as created in God’s image and likeness; it is an instinct of an inherent spirituality to desire that we be cherished in all that we do because, in making us both flesh and spirit, God has endowed us with the capacity to be like Him, a more perfect spiritual Being than which it is not possible to imagine.
The highest thing that we can do after loving God is to love our neighbor as ourselves: The two greatest commandments encapsulate this fact. Is not our felt need to be observed in relation, to be seen living and to receive confirmation of that “being seen” through “Likes” on Facebook and “Retweets” on Twitter evidence of this need to know ourselves as being loved?
Forgetting the fact that God always sees us in love results in an idolatrous search for imitations of love, for virtual relationships, for the impersonal responses of people on social networks whom we may never know, never meet, never be able to enjoy as persons in relation. Social networks as “replacement therapy” for lack of loving communion are ineffective solutions to the problem.
Strengthening eucharistic faith reinforces the lived experience of a loving and present God who never turns His gaze away from us. Faithful prayer and worship, especially the eucharistic prayer of the holy Mass and eucharistic adoration of Jesus Christ truly present, reinforce faith in and conscious awareness of the loving and personal presence of God — especially if we leave our cell phones in the car.
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(Follow me at Reverendo Padre-Kevin M. Cusick on Facebook or MCITLFrAphorism in Twitter. I blog occasionally at mcitl.blogspot.com and APriestLife.blogspot.com. Email me at mcitl.blogspot.com@gmail.com.)
