What do you get when you combine the recent uproar over Facebook’s manipulation of newsfeed data and the Presbyterian Church’s posture on the issues of same-sex marriage? My feeling — and it is a feeling/slash/argument — is that we get the polarization that will be baked into the pie (charts) of the western world for generations to come. We get the religiosity of reductionism. And we get covenantal amnesia and perhaps entropy, which would make John Calvin burn himself at the stake.
Think of the ingredients that formally made up the ethos of Protestantism in the 20th century (the last century) — with Karl Barth whispering in the wings about the great chasm between the “Word of God and the Word of Man.” And then think about what’s been happening for the last 14 years:
- Denominations like the P.C. (U.S.A.) continue to emphasize one side or the other of the equation, with the result that we have evangelicals doing evangelical theology and liberals doing liberation theology and never do they meet without calling each other names or demanding capitulation.
- Meanwhile, the megachurch phenomena consolidates its power to form the most gnostic of world views. Places of worship become either “centers” and/or “campuses” that are circled in upon themselves. Missionaries venture out into the big, bad world (which may be one’s own cul-de-sac), but the world’s questions are irrelevant to the missionary message. American Populism, it seems to me, is rife with an emphasis upon purity, and those who question or remain ambivalent about the non-essentials are muzzled.
- Add to these two convoluted dynamics the proliferation — nay, the exponential explosion !!! — of cyberspace-networking and the result is a congealed sense of what it means to be a Christian witness in the United States of America.
- And finally, sprinkle the fragments of what was once the clergy guild (with our pension plans) into the economic instability of the age, and what have we got?
Both the proponents and the critics of Facebook call it Emotional Contagion, and my contention is that it is this modus operandi that passes now for Covenantal Theology. That is to say, in the same ways that a recent Cornell study revealed the effects on 689,003 individuals who “like” various posts or images, we too have “liked” ourselves into defining marriage! And we’ve liked ourselves into believing that our definitions will have catastrophic effect on human history.
Facebook, as we know, has a policy statement that amounts to a pseudo-covenant. It’s an agreement between the network’s programmers and its 1.11 billion users. In approximately 9,000 words Mark Zuckerberg and company stipulate that they can (legally) and will (commercially) make use of the personal tidbits that we provide.
Consequently, if we happen to forward an item in the news and we’d like to comment on this item, rest assured, more than our friends and family members will take note; and among the notes these data-gurus jot down will be our tendencies to pass on either depressive or pollyanna-ish remarks.
What’s on your mind?
This recent Hobby Lobby decision of the Supreme Court sets a terrible precedent and I’m worried for the future of “Religious Freedom” in this country. If the employer’s authentic belief trumps the employee’s authentic belief, are the courtsnow in a position to test authenticity? You suck, Alito!
What’s on your mind?
The weather has been wonderful lately, and I’m so happy for all of my friends and especially those who’ve invited me to their lake places for the 4th of July weekend! Yippee!
You see, along with their accompanying shared links, comments like these are apparently filtered for feeling. What the algorithm-masters do is not only invade our privacy, but subsequently they work to massage our news-feeds to promote more positive posts in the future. The covenant goes like so: “While you are allowing us to use the information we receive about you, you always own all your information…”
You always own…
You always own…
You always own…
I’d like to linger on those three words for remainder of piece because they remind me of the three-fold litany that Jeremiah mocks in the seventh chapter of the book that bears the prophet’s name. In that case, what smacks of piety is truly a plea for their perception of “God” to keep the occupants of Jerusalem insulated from the world at large:
This is the temple of the Lord…
This is the temple of the Lord…
This is the temple of the Lord…
Hopefully this correlation isn’t yet overshadowed by the Leviathan-project that is the on-line delivery of information. My point is that the Internet’s detached and ghostly bits of information run parallel to what remains of the temple in Jerusalem. (Our wailing today doesn’t only take place at the base of a ruined wall… but on a plethora of websites.)
We are not owners of our information anymore than the faithful of 587 BCE were owners of that place of witness to the God of Israel.
Self-ownership, make no mistake, is a Libertarian tenet of faith and not one that is encouraged by the traditions contained in either the Hebrew Scriptures nor the Greek New Testament.
What we are, in fact, is owned… bought with a price, the price of God’s Own Self, alive in the form of a vulnerable Palestinian Jew of the first century. (And while this is undoubtedly a grand metaphor, it’s a paradox that deserves lots of prayerful thought and perhaps the taming of emotional outrage!)
What we are is a Covenant People, and this covenant is so amazingly one-sided is impossible to exaggerate. Are we called to a faith-response? Yes, I believe so. But let’s be honest, our co-missioning by Jesus does not include the hegemonic consolidation of power in the hope of defining marriage.
Do we feel strongly about this unique relationship and about its status in the public (read secular) vernacular? Do some feel that same-sex couples ought to be recognized before God and all others if they chose, or feel led, to marry? Do others feel, on the contrary, that marriage has recently been, and ought to remain, between one man and one woman? Yes, given the rancor on display, this much is obvious. Emotional contagion carries the day (and emotional carrion, the night). And yet, what about that alleged covenant that so many, over the last 2,000+ years, have held up as preeminent? A covenant that may ultimately revolutionize our feelings, thoughts and actions?
To remain faithful to this covenant is not to communicate good-fellow-feelings among the like-minded.
To remain faithful to this covenant is to persevere in thought, word and deed, cherishing fidelity in all our relationships and monogamy (over genitalia) within marriage.
