DIsscusion Thread - Embodied vs Digital Spiritual Growth
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Jun 18, 2024
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Uploaded by LieutenantMeerkatMaster1127
Christians Growing Spiritually Online
In today’s post-COVID society this section of the text takes on a more poignant discussion given all the perceived complications of existing in a socially distant world. As we have seen over the past few years due to the physical constraints of social distancing, people have flocked to the digital domain to live, work, and recreate online. One aspect that has remained after Covid is the trend of “Tele-Church.” As a pathway of searching for the Truth, Heather Glover asserted, “Among the growing numbers of Americans who are using the Internet,
many of them are turning to the digital dimension to get in touch with God and pursue matters of
faith.”
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Many churches have continued their online presence to accommodate those potential seekers of faith the opportunity to have an experience with the Almighty from the comfort of their own home. The online dimension of church has afforded more encounters with the Gospel and has been a force multiplier to the traditional brick and mortal institutions. Full disclosure, my family and I have attended online church an occasion because of the in logistical convenience, accidentally waking up late, and the unforeseen sick kiddo. Community is community, whether it is online or in-person. An individual can be lonely in a crowded room of believers or fully engaged with an online group chat, community is what you make of it. As we are made in the image of God, we have the ability to be anywhere in the world at any given time inside our “mind’s eye.” This very limited version of our soul’s omnipresence allows us as humans to have long-distance relationships, because at the core of our
relationships is the emotional and intellectual component that drives our interpersonal connections. These key relational elements rely on the virtual essence of the mind more so than the physical proximity of a person to form meaningful connections. If you are honest and real with the person you are engaging with, it doesn’t matter where you physically are in the world you can still make a meaningful connection and subsequently grow in your faith. We have been doing this for millennia, via pen-pals, long distance calls to a friend or confidant at 11:30 at night, to even now with the use of FaceTime and Skype to add the video component of long-distance communication. Keck concluded from his analysis when he wrote, “Paul regarded his letters as stand-ins for his own presence. When a letter from Paul was read, it was as though Paul himself were speaking.”
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This is how we read Facebook or Twitter posts in our mind as if the person is actually speaking to us in that moment when we read the post. The online experience can bring in a new facet of this distributed existence. As a result, we need to be ever vigilant with our online witness as believers, because the lines of reality have been irrevocably blurred between the online experiences and our physical realities and we need to present Jesus everywhere we go virtually as well as in-person. 1
Stephen D. Lowe and Mary E. Lowe, Ecologies of Faith in a Digital Age: Spiritual Growth through Online Education (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2018), 71.
2
Ibid., 110.
When evaluating if Christians can grow spiritually in an online environment versus a face to face setting we have to decide what the goals are and are they being met. Communities consist of people and groups of people that share a common purpose and goal.
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Can an online setting create such a community, and if so is it inferior to the classroom setting?
Evaluating the idea of distance learning is not a new idea and didn’t spawn from the cyber era. The Apostle Paul wrote letters to various churches that were to be read aloud to their congregations, these readings were meant to stand in the place of Paul. Lowe and Lowe tell us that starting in the second century the church adopted the doctrine of “the communion of saints”, this was built on Paul’s “spiritual union of the body of Christ”.
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This idea claimed there was no boundary for the Holy Spirit, he didn’t recognize the perceived issue associated with the lack of a physical presence.
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The relationship is important not the means in which the message is delivered.
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There is thought that a sense of detachment is associated with the online model, but no glaring evidence of this detachment exists. We experience growth through our relationship with others, we don’t confine our growth to our own experiences.
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Religious online groups have shown evidence that the individuals shared core faith results in an “investment” in each member.
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Their life experiences and faith journey allow a freer exchange of ideas and contribute to each member’s education and spiritual growth. Lowe
and Lowe state “It’s not just the academy that has a spiritually formative influence on students; social contexts like conversations, interaction with others, worshipping together, and living out real life with a community members play just as great a part in student’s spiritual formation.”
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The means by which we consume and interact with information and communities should not be deemed to have any significance. The common connection to Christ and his community is consistent across all mediums if one is connected to the “body of Christ”
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The value of community in our pursuit toward sanctification can’t be ignored.
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God created us to be a participant in his created ecology, we are not one being, we are a participant
in his master plan. We were designed to nurture our spirituality through our brothers and sisters in Christ and how we pursue his goal is insignificant.
Christopher,
I think that your discussion post is well written and on point. Community in every sense of the meaning is a construct of the mind. If we as individuals feel a greater sense of identity with a larger group of individuals it doesn’t matter where this group is physically located. The connection we make is with our minds not always our physical bodies, since we can empathize what someone on the other side of the planet if we know they just went through the same experience that we have had. God designed us that way from the beginning of time to have communion with Him in our soul and spirit. As you so accurately cited, the Apostle Paul tapped
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