Confession: I spend way too much time on email and the Web. If I spent half as much time on prayer and the Bible, or even just getting to know my neighbors better, what a beneficial earthquake it would be in my life.
We hear about digital natives, my grandson’s generation whose whole existence has been lit by the magic screen. But the painful truth is that many of us, me included, may already be “digital captives” — happy slaves to our devices and willing dancers to their siren song.
My insistence on sticking with an older Verizon flip phone, and only occasionally flirting with Siri on my wife’s smartphone, may sometimes come off as reverse snobbery. But it’s actually a “stay on the wagon” self-defense move.
Given how readily distractable I am (“Squirrel!”), it’s quite possible all productivity and (material) sociability would vanish from my life, were I to handcuff myself to a spiffy new iPhone 6 like we just got Donna.
So I’m passing along to you a good piece from the Washington Post, of all places, entitled “How the Church can Rescue us from our Smartphones,” written by Russell Moore with a prompt from Andrew Sullivan.
Since I usually happen to agree with Moore both religiously and politically, and seldom agree with Sullivan on either front, if both are on the same page with regard to freeing us all from digital captivity, it probably deserves our thoughtful attention — offscreen!