Christian Research Journal Reads Episode 121: Cream or Sugar: Fostering Authentic Community in the Expanding Age of Social Media

This is Episode 121 of Christian Research Journal Reads.This is an audio version of the CHRISTIAN RESEARCH JOURNAL article, “Cream or Sugar: Fostering Authentic Community in the Expanding Age of Social Media”  by Kyle A. Keating.  This article first appeared in the Postmodern Realities column of the Christian Research Journal, volume 41, number 3 (2018).  It was accompanied by Postmodern Realities Episode 074: Authentic Community in the Age of Social Media. 
https://www.equip.org/articles/cream-or-sugar-fostering-authentic-community-in-the-expanding-age-of-social-media/

This podcast presents audio versions of Christian Research Journal articles. As the flagship publication of the Christian Research Institute, the Journal seeks to equip followers of Christ to think and to live Christianly—to exercise truth and experience life. Truth, especially essential Christian doctrine, forms the basis for how we live our lives in Christ. As the apostle Paul instructed Timothy in 1 Tim. 4:16, “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.”The Christian Research Journal enjoyed a print incarnation of almost 45 years. Now exclusively an online publication, the Journal consists of thousands of free articles. We hope that through these audio articles you are not only equipped to proclaim and defend your faith but that as a disciple you also draw closer to Christ in your walk with Him.  You can find the written version of each article that is an episode of Christian Research Journal Reads at the website of the Christian Research Institute, equip.org. All Christian Research Journal articles at equip.org are completely free and do not require a subscription and are not under a paywall.All episodes will be available at the following podcast platforms with more being added daily! You can help spread the word about this new podcast by giving us a rating and review from the other channels we are listed on and telling others!Our Website at the new special link and off our Journal main page.   

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
This is episode one hundred and twenty one of the
Christian Research Journal Reads Podcast. Cream or Sugar Fostering Authentic
Community in the Expanding Age of Social Media by Kyle A. Keating.
This article first appeared in the print edition in the

(00:26):
Postmodern Realities column, Volume forty one, number three in twenty eighteen.
The Christian Research Journal Reads Podcast presents audio versions of
Christian Research Journal articles. To read this full article and
its documentation, please go to equip dot org. That's e

(00:48):
quip dot org.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Cream or Sugar Fostering Authentic Community in the Expanding Age
of Social Media. This article is by Kylie Keating and
is read by an automated voice Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat.
As the ubiquity of social media expands, we are drawn,
whether unwittingly or not, into their arbit a relentless cycle

(01:13):
demanding as much of our time, energy, and attention we
choose to offer for human beings who are created in
the image of our try and creator and shared his
characteristic impulse to coward relationship. Social media provides an avenue
for both knowing and being known for community, whether it's
finding a neat Facebook group for a particular hobby or
life experience connecting with people otherwise unknown via Twitter or

(01:38):
watching distant friends raise their family and Instagram. Each provides
opportunities to create long lasting community. Yet a growing number
of people, both Christian and non Christian alike, are increasingly
worry about social media's promise of providing a meaningful community.
How many followers of those Internet famous celebrities know how
they take their coffee. We can mass any number of

(02:00):
fans and followers who will favorite Richt, tweet, and share
our every post, and yet remain utterly alone and isolated
in the process. The Internet and social media in particular
sing a siren song of a suit of gnosticism. Its
sweet refrain tells us we need not be limited by
the locality of our human bodies. We can be everywhere

(02:21):
and know everyone, and they can in turn know us.
But while being human means being made for community, it
also means being limited, finite, and placed in fact, in
the locality of the human body. We are not on
a present nor omnipotent. So while social media makes it
very difficult to be alone, it also can make us
desperately lonely. The limitations of social media perhaps the greatest

(02:44):
danger of social media is not that it is in
itself an insufficient form of community, but rather its tendency
to push other forms of community to the margins in
order to make space for its ever expanding demands. Research
suggests that in the brain, social media can, like an
addictive substance, trigger the chemical dopamine, resulting in a sense
of euphoria of pleasure and satisfaction. As social media demands

(03:09):
more and more of our time and energy, it can
lead us to ignore the people right in front of us.
The images are all too familiar family holiday gatherings where
everyone is staring at a device, friends at a concert
holding up phones to record and share their experience, co
workers gathered around the table for lunch, checking their tweets
and feeds, but ignoring conversation with each other. In fact,

(03:32):
it is now yesterday's news that social media has been
engineered intentionally to pull us into a compulsive cycle with
its likes and notifications, so much so that some of
the creators of the apps themselves have confessed to avoiding
them and make sure their children do too. Thus, while
it is tempting to view social media as a morally
neutral tool used for good or ill, the inclination toward idolatry,

(03:56):
already so natural to fall in people, is actually being
programmed into our brains. Additionally, for a generation that professes
to value authenticity above all else, we find ourselves in
love with a form of community that is constructed around
carefully manicured representations of who we imagine ourselves to be. Thus,
we see social media as performative art, where digital presence

(04:19):
is often little more than a carefully curated advertisement for
potential employers, friends, or romantic partners. The longing to be
loved and accepted, when wrapped up in our culture's ubiquitous consumerism,
becomes a compulsion to present the best versions of ourselves,
repeatedly retaking selfies until the angle is sufficiently flattering, crafting

(04:39):
our personal brand to appeal to just the right sorts
of people. Often the right sorts of people are also
those who believe all the same things we do. All
too often, our social media spheres become ideological echo chambers
that affirm all of our positions, and, as Marilyn Robinson
points out, incentivize us to disparage without knowledge information about

(05:01):
the thing disparaged to gain the pleasure of sharing an
attitude one knows is socially approved. That is to say,
social media provides a place for virtue signaling where we
can proclaim our allegiances and virtues and receive attendant affirmation
in praise, all without the weight of backing them up
with substantive action. Thus, even as social media connects us

(05:22):
to like minded people, it could create a false sense
of righteousness and vindication, as our every opinion is echoed
with a hearty am n from the crowd. Echo chambers
prevent us from hearing constructive criticism and force us into
a US versus them paradigm where every disagreement becomes totalized
into either affirmation or betrayal of the cause, whatever it

(05:43):
may be. Thus, our communities can become little more than
narrow tribes, unwilling to confront challenges from without or within. WHENO.
Berry once wrote, people use drugs legal and illegal because
their lives are intolerably painful or dull. They hate their
work and find no rest in their leisure. They are

(06:03):
estranged from their families and their neighbors. It should tell
us something that in healthy society's drug use is celebrative, convivial,
and occasional, whereas among us it is lonely, shameful, and addictive.
We need drugs, apparently because we have lost each other.
Barry was writing before the age of social media, but
replace the word drugs with social media and the sentiment

(06:24):
would be no less true. A fully realized community, we
need a more fulfilling, deeply satisfying community than what social
media can offer. We need something more than a potentially
distracting addiction or a place to advertise our best selves
or find cheap affirmation. Our longing to be both known
and loved cannot be met by likes, red tweets, and shares.

(06:46):
It can be found only in the Gospel, where we
can be both fully known and fully loved. As pastor
and author Tim Keller writes, the Gospel liberates us from pretense,
humbles us out of our self righteousness, and fortifies us
for any difficulty life can throw at us. The reality
that God fully knows and fully loves his people at
the same time is both the heart of the Gospel

(07:08):
and the foundation of Christian community. To be fully known
and fully loved requires being known and loved in the flesh.
While Christians rightly recognize the truth of God's love in Christ,
we must experience it tangibly as well. We need someone
who can make us a cup of coffee and already
knows how we take it. A community where knowledge of
both the mundane and intimate is married with a security

(07:31):
that comes from mutual trust and a commitment to sharing
the same space. This type of community can be fulfilled
only in something more immediate and personal than social media.
We need the church and the particular relationships created within
to offer true north in the midst of an increasingly
transient and digital world. The community of the church provides

(07:52):
a number of essential resources for us as we go
out in the world. The church offers a place of
safety and security in which its people can be truly
vulnerable as they confess their individual and collective need for grace.
The church can be a place where we cultivate character,
the wisdom and courage to do what is right in
the face of overwhelming cultural pressure, to bend our ethics

(08:14):
whenever it is convenient, and then hold one another accountable
to that standard. With the dangers of social media, readily
visible and fully realized community found in the local church,
what don't we do with social media to say that
we should avoid social media altogether is too easy of
an answer. It accounts for all the worst pitfalls, but
fails to imagine the possibility of using social media responsibly.

(08:38):
Blaster Roberts offers a metaphor that suggests another possibility. The
church is like the boat from which oxygen can be
pumped to submerge divers, preventing them from drowning in the
abyss and providing them with somewhere save to which they
can resurface. We are better social media users when we
are rooted in something other than social media. The best
way to avoid social media is potentially addictive is to

(09:01):
have a deeper community that pushes social media back out
to the margins of our lives. The best way to
avoid its performance driven approval cycle is to find that
approval in a community founded on the collective understanding of
a desperate need for grace. The best way to avoid
its self righteous virtue signaling is to be connected to
a community that forms our character and holds us accountable.

(09:22):
Of course, we are forever aware that the church is
broken in a thousand ways because it is a community
of sinfill people. But it is nevertheless a community of
sinfill people looking to a sinless Christ who both calls
us and empowers us to give and receive the vulnerable,
sacrificial and intimate love necessary for a fully realized community.

(09:43):
So put on a pot of coffee to brew, and
in case we ever meet, hold the cream and sugar.
I take mine black.

Speaker 1 (09:50):
Thank you for listening to another episode from the Christian
Research Journal Reads podcast, which provides audio articles of Christian
Research Journal articles. If you go to equip dot org,
you will find a brand new article for the Christian
Research Journal published weekly. In addition, please subscribe to our
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(10:15):
find the Christian Research Journal Reads podcast, the Postmodern Realities podcast,
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(10:37):
studio and into his study to engage in in depth,
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of the most interesting and informative people on the planet.
At equip dot org, you will also find a lot
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(10:58):
Research Journal articles. That's e q u i p dot
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