Heart of Matter: Meaningful Technology
July 6, 2023//
“Whereas in the past religion fulfilled the need for transcendence by harnessing the powers of the spirit, now technology is supplanting the role of religion to connect us in a way that is meaningful for us.”
Ilia Delio, Making All Things New
+
“En el pasado la religión satisfacía la necesidad de trascendencia, aprovechando los poderes del espíritu. Ahora la tecnología está suplantando el papel de la religión y nos conecta de una manera significativa para nosotros.”
Ilia Delio, Making All Things New
What is being asked?
What is being moved?
View print-friendly version
Posted in Heart of Matter
6 Comments
Related Posts
Heart of Matter: “The Divine Entanglement”
“While panentheism is a helpful concept, the language of pantheism and panentheism is based on concepts of ‘being’ and ‘nature’ that can lead to misguided images of distinct beings in…
Friends, I stand gently corrected. As an old-timer, I have long been used to thinking in terms of inner substance and outer form, means and ends. I too am grateful for new (electronic) ways of communicating and being spiritually present. Thus, I am glad to send some money electronically to parts unseen by me so that material and emotional needs may be fulfilled by others. Like the centurion who trusted Jesus to heal the servant without being physically next to him, I commit my trust to the cyber world so that wholesome human deeds may thereby follow. Peace and all good!
Dear George,
Thank you—peace and all good to you too! We always appreciate you and your insights. And, agree—let’s use wisdom to create meaningful connections, in and through technology. As Sr.Ilia suggests; to grow and “create an internet of love.”
Wow, this sort of knocked me back a bit, but then I considered what it was actually saying and individual meaning-making, and I guess it’s actually true, though a bit horrifying at first. Yikes! I guess you could also have that online community feeling of sorts of shared meaning. Somehow though having experienced virtual zoom services and now F2F, there’s so much serendipity that happens in the F2F. I don’t think true community of the sort I feel, can be created with these tech. groupings and so, though I’d concur that some meaning-making can be gratifying thru tech in the old way religion served, there are essential elements of the “old religion” meetings that can’t be satisfied quite so readily, at least for me and folks like me.:)
To spiritualize something involves separating it from matter, “dividing it asunder” from matter, emotion, and thought in consciousness, as one separates/extracts iron from ore, or wheat from chaff, gathering itself in pure form, like bees make honey from nectar. As spirit is light, all things both radiate and detect light, bar none. Whether in spiritual or physical form, information can be encoded and extracted from light. Thus to spiritualize something is to make it virtual, or to “virtualize” it, dissolving the form without losing the energy, which being purged from the weight of form, rises to a ever higher vibrational/virtual planes in its ascent back to origins (Omega). Material reality is merely a shadowy interface or simulation of the virtual world that informs, jackets and encodes it, acting like WI-FI and cellular light waves in our digitally enhanced world. Said Dorothy when Oz morphed technicolor from black and white, “Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.” Thus, matter and spirit imply each other, the latter swaddling and energizing the former, “virtually” giving it life, form, and color. The technological revolution merely mimics or parallels that of its evolutionary counterpart in the interior life of humans, virtual beings having a human/material experience on their way home again in the Virtual Kingdom of Light (Land of Oz).
I suppose there was a context for the statement published here. By itself, it is not worth a comment. I can’t think of how technology can provoke spirituality or prayer. A God that incarnated Godself to inspire, console, and otherwise bless–now this is worth my devotion. Religion is not a problem to be solved by quitting it. The problem is the human proclivity to impatience, short-sightedness and arrogance. Human need, environmental distress, societal corruption–call for response that may be far from technological scope.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Thank you. You are correct. There is more to say on this statement. It is a small morsel from Ilia’s book, Making All Things New. It is meant to stir a response to percolate on. We are hopeful to continue to enliven conversation around the world on the intricate dance of hearts and minds…as we gather our left and right brains. We are so grateful that you took the time to discuss (as always) how this is moving for you.