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Should we have a theological perspective on technology

Recent PhD graduate Stephen Garner weighs the interface between technology and humanity.

In our garden there is a path that runs from the back door to the clothesline. At the start of the path, the boundary between path and lawn is easy to see, but by the time the path gets to the clothesline it’s less obvious. The lawn has encroached upon the path, and the boundary between grass and concrete slabs is now blurred. A similar blurring of boundaries is also a recurrent theme in discussions about contemporary technology. Under pressure from new digital and biotechnologies, the borders between human and non-human, organic and inorganic, natural and synthetic, creature and machine are sometimes hard to discern. In many ways technology has ceased to be just a tool we use, but instead is now the very environment in which we exist. It is as if we have become invisibly wrapped in media.

Awareness of this dependence upon technology, and its power to reshape our world, is seen in both a sense of wonder that human beings can achieve such things, and also in a sense of anxiety that we will misuse this power. In particular, recent cinema has seen a progression of films that ask questions about what it means to be human and how to live with the consequences of human technological power. These responses to technology mirror a Christian understanding that human relationships with technology are ambiguous. On the one hand, those relationships can become idolatrous and displace God, and technology can be used as an unjust instrument of power over others, including the natural world. On the other hand, technology can become the vehicle through which human beings carry out their response to God in creative, compassionate and just ways.

When we look at the environments that we live within, such as our workplaces, our churches, our schools and our homes, it is critical that we ask ourselves whether the technologies we use are appropriate to a calling to be creative, compassionate and just before God. Are the technologies we employ appropriate to the task at hand; do they solve the perceived problem; what other problems do they create? Are they ecologically sound and sustainable, not just for our local community, but also in light of other more distant communities that might be affected by them and their production? Do the technologies we use create social injustices, working in ways that marginalise or dehumanise parts of our community? And how do these technologies affect us at a personal level, possibly becoming idols in their own right?

Answering these questions will be an ongoing process, but it is critical to address them if the church and its members are to understand what it means to be the people of God in a technocultural world. It will involve listening not only to the voices of the technologists and theologians, but also to the voices of everyday people who use and are affected by technology in our society.

This means that we must listen to the voices of those who have grown up within a culture permeated with the presence of home computers, video games, the Internet and participatory media, as well as those who haven’t. It means listening to how technology affects our workplaces and businesses, as well as listening to those on the wrong side of the “digital divide”, where issues to do with poverty, debt and other forms of disadvantage work to establish an “information poverty”. The voices of those involved in areas such as medicine, teaching, and pastoral care also need to be heard, as do the voices of those who are served by those areas. And. finally, it will involve talking to members of our congregations – young and old, male and female – about how the technologies in their world shape life and faith.

By listening to these various voices, and the hopes and fears that they express about technologies in our society, we can build up a better picture of the world around us in order to speak back into our individual lives, our church communities and the wider communities that we belong to, and to act in ways that use technology creatively, compassionately and justly before God.

Stephen Garner recently completed a PhD in Theology at the University of Auckland engaging with emerging digital technologies. He is a contributor to the Wikiklesia Project  www.wikiklesia.org and blogs about science, faith, technology, and pop culture at www.greenflame.org.