Electronic Communion

by Julie Richardson Brown

Anyone who knows me well knows that I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with technology.

My Samsung BlackJack II is never far from my grasp and my laptop is one of my best friends. Both enable me to work just as easily from my office as from my front porch (or more likely, the closest Panera). Deepening my love for these instant means of connection is that I’ve lived in numerous states and even more cities, and so my circle of friends and family extends much further than the boundaries of metro Louisville. I’m glad my daughter can Skype with Tia in California, thankful I can reach out to faraway lifelong friends at a moment’s notice, and grateful that when the youth I am privileged to work with need to ask a difficult question, texting gives them a way to do so without the potential awkwardness of a face-to-face conversation.

That’s all the love part. Now here’s the hate part…

I hate that sometimes I miss what my darling preschooler Maddy is doing because I’m responding to a text message that really can wait. I hate that sometimes Dave and I are sitting on the couch together at the end of a long day – both of us checking Facebook instead of talking to each other. I hate that I’ve developed a habit of checking my phone for texts, messages and emails first thing in the morning (though I clearly don’t hate that habit enough to work on kicking it!). I hate that it is more and more difficult for me to “unplug” on vacations or the weekend. I might miss something, you know?

Most of all, I hate that the art of in-person, human conversation is being lost and communication is far too often reduced to the limited grammar and vocabulary of an instant message or the oh-so popular “text.” (Confession: I adore my qwerty keyboard and can fire off a TM with the best of them.) I am so convinced that any lasting theology must be a relational one that I have become terribly fearful that our Internet-spawned global village will, in fact, leave us isolated and alone, unable to discover the joy of finding God in one another.

But this week…this week I’ve had a revelation of sorts – one that has come to me in the all-too-short life of a beautiful little girl named Elizabeth. Elizabeth died this week at eight months old. The universe and I are not on speaking terms about this, the random cruelty of it all being too much for my heart to take in. I will not blame God or ask God why – mostly because I believe God is also crying for Elizabeth and that God is asking “why?” too. I will, however, admit to my anger and sadness being almost too deep for prayer – and so I’m resigning to live in the terrible hold of that anger and sadness for a while, knowing I will eventually find a small sliver of hope somewhere. Perhaps it will be in the lives of Elizabeth’s parents, who have been shining beacons of grace in the last few days.

Elizabeth’s parents are part of a community that has, in the last few days, grown large beyond all reason. Via wall posts, messages, IM’s and notes, Elizabeth’s life is being grieved and celebrated, and I am amazed at the power of the Spirit moving within the World Wide Web every time I hit “refresh” on my own profile page. They are, in every way, surrounded by prayer and love and I have found myself hoping desperately that they realize how cared for they are – and how many hearts are breaking over Elizabeth’s death. For them, and for me, gracious spirituality has been set loose via the digital world, and though I long to hug Elizabeth’s mother about every other minute, I find myself breathing a prayer of thanks that at least I and others like me can reach out to her electronically.

I clearly remember the first cell phone call I made. I remember the first email I received (from a boy I was so infatuated with that seeing his email address on the screen caused my heart to skip a beat!). I remember instant messaging with my dad during long seminary nights, asking for his help as I struggled with Tillich and Kierkegaard and Augustine. And in the early days of the long-distance romance that led to me marrying Dave, email was my salvation. All that said, I’ve kicked and screamed a bit into this new age of technology—until this week.

Now I think I’ll spend some time figuring out how we, as church, might harvest the goodness of instant connection in a way that helps us draw closer to one another and to God. And, I suspect, the answers lie in text messages from searching teenagers and emails from family I can’t live without, and prayers for Elizabeth being circulated with great frequency among the Body of Christ.

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Julie Richardson Brown is Minister of Youth and Young Adults at Beargrass Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Louisville, KY. She is a self-professed coffee snob with a deep affinity for dark chocolate, good books and a small corner in which to write. Julie’s iPod would reveal her abiding love for Indigo Girls. Her two year-old Madeleine is the center of her world—and she’s pretty fond of her husband, David, too.