I was visiting my friend Mark’s facebook profile to wish him a “happy b’day” where I stumbled across his profile picture saying that he has given up facebook for lent.
My first thought was, ‘Well that stinks.’ Then I adapted my birthday message to say, ‘in 40 days’ or something along those lines. Then I began to wonder, why would you give up facebook for lent?
Maybe I have a different understanding of the social media sphere than many. I use these mediums for work and creative outlets. I’m not sure God cares for me to stop working and stop creating..
But what is lent & the practice of sacrificing that comes along with the season of lent? Is the lenten fasting just a stopping of practices that we hope to take back up again? Or are our lent fasting practices putting aside something that we know is harmful to us and we use this season to rid ourselves of the habit in order to not bring them back into our life? If smoking is bad for you, stopping for lent (except for the sundays) with the knowledge that you will start smoking again Easter Sunday seems totally counter to the spirit of preparing yourself for a resurrection & ministry in Christ.
Again, I see facebook as a relationship enabler. For example, I saw Mark just a week or two ago. I had no idea that his birthday was looming (I am super bad at birthdays, even my own). So one of my practices is to check out who’s birthdays are happening that day in facebook, and then wish them well. I don’t see anything harmful about that practice. It takes me a few minutes. I see everyone in my list of ‘friends’ and enjoy checking in on who has changed (checked out one persons new child this morning, that was news to me).
Maybe, facebook / twitter / linkedin, email etc become some distraction to people. Okay, I get that. However, is it a distraction more because of how you use the medium? Or is it a distraction because of how you let the medium use you?
Facebook, and the other social media mediums, connect people to people. That is not a bad thing. However, a sacrificial practice that is life giving in my opinion would be to not give up outlets to a mas of people, but to take the medium to focus one or two people.
You see, we now have some hyper-relationships, many relationships saying & doing many things. How about slowing that down to say, I’m going to take one day during Lent to scan my ‘friends’ and then pray for them, read up on their profile, check out their photos, ala. updating my understanding of them. From there you have a deeper understanding of the circle of influence that God has placed before you and are more able to live into that ministry of being neighbor.
Speaking of, I believe my neighbor is having their 3rd child (a girl) today, but she has yet to post it on her facebook profile to make it official. I’m waiting!!
Did you see Adam Walker-Cleaveland and Bruce Reyes-Chow’s posts on social media fasts for Lent? Some similar reflections.
http://pomomusings.com/2011/03/09/social-networking-lent/
http://www.reyes-chow.com/2010/02/what-not-to-give-up-for-lent.html
I hadn’t, but I’m not surprised if Adam & I have similar thoughts
Did you see Adam Walker-Cleaveland and Bruce Reyes-Chow’s posts on social media fasts for Lent? Some similar reflections.
http://pomomusings.com/2011/03/09/social-networking-lent/
http://www.reyes-chow.com/2010/02/what-not-to-give-up-for-lent.html
I hadn’t, but I’m not surprised if Adam & I have similar thoughts
Gavin,
Thanks for your thoughts (and for your birthday wishes!). By the way, I failed to disable my FB email notifications and so I saw by subject line that you had sent your wishes. Ah the imperfections of lenten discipline.
For me, “giving up” something for lent has nothing to do with the virtue of the thing given up. Instead it is a reminder, a call to prayer. So I often look for something that I know I will notice often. I don’t consider time on Facebook as wasted time. It is beneficial and good to be in community in all its forms. I only elected to focus my lenten discipline on its absence because I knew I would be reminded to pray often. The thing itself isn’t the point.
What I find is that my pattern is to go from email checking to facebook checking without thought. Disrupting my pattern during lent provides a helpful aid in patterning my observance to the life, death and resurrection of Christ.
I meant to respond to the FB birthday wishes on Sunday (feast day) but I was distracted…This week perhaps.
Peace,
Mark
My thoughts exactly when I fasted fb 2 years ago.
Gavin,
Thanks for your thoughts (and for your birthday wishes!). By the way, I failed to disable my FB email notifications and so I saw by subject line that you had sent your wishes. Ah the imperfections of lenten discipline.
For me, “giving up” something for lent has nothing to do with the virtue of the thing given up. Instead it is a reminder, a call to prayer. So I often look for something that I know I will notice often. I don’t consider time on Facebook as wasted time. It is beneficial and good to be in community in all its forms. I only elected to focus my lenten discipline on its absence because I knew I would be reminded to pray often. The thing itself isn’t the point.
What I find is that my pattern is to go from email checking to facebook checking without thought. Disrupting my pattern during lent provides a helpful aid in patterning my observance to the life, death and resurrection of Christ.
I meant to respond to the FB birthday wishes on Sunday (feast day) but I was distracted…This week perhaps.
Peace,
Mark
My thoughts exactly when I fasted fb 2 years ago.
I have given up Facebook this Lent because I found it hugely unhelpful, both with regards to my focus and ability to work, and on my purity as a Christian. With almost unlimited access to people’s photos, it was pretty easy to fall into a trap of basically online stalking. Thus I thought action was required.
I agree that social networks can be used for good, but I realised that I wasn’t using them, they were using me. So I decided to give up Facebook for Lent.
Since giving it up, I have found I have much more phone conversations with people: if I want to talk to someone, instead of ‘posting on their wall’ I now ACTUALLY talk to them! Similarly, I don’t just post a ‘maybe’ on someone’s event: I bloody well show up, and on time!
So all in all, giving up Facebook has actually increased my social network, because I’m actively going out and catching up with friends, instead of stalking them at my desk.
God bless you, and keep up the interesting blogging!
I have given up Facebook this Lent because I found it hugely unhelpful, both with regards to my focus and ability to work, and on my purity as a Christian. With almost unlimited access to people’s photos, it was pretty easy to fall into a trap of basically online stalking. Thus I thought action was required.
I agree that social networks can be used for good, but I realised that I wasn’t using them, they were using me. So I decided to give up Facebook for Lent.
Since giving it up, I have found I have much more phone conversations with people: if I want to talk to someone, instead of ‘posting on their wall’ I now ACTUALLY talk to them! Similarly, I don’t just post a ‘maybe’ on someone’s event: I bloody well show up, and on time!
So all in all, giving up Facebook has actually increased my social network, because I’m actively going out and catching up with friends, instead of stalking them at my desk.
God bless you, and keep up the interesting blogging!
I am not into “social networking”; although many enjoy it, it seems to me an unnecessary waste of my time!
My understanding of sacrifice is the giving-up of something we enjoy – not something we want to live without. To give up smoking, alcohol, or any of the many other things which are unhealthy or perhaps undesirable is not really a sacrifice. It may certainly be an admirable goal or pursuit however!
I am not into “social networking”; although many enjoy it, it seems to me an unnecessary waste of my time!
My understanding of sacrifice is the giving-up of something we enjoy – not something we want to live without. To give up smoking, alcohol, or any of the many other things which are unhealthy or perhaps undesirable is not really a sacrifice. It may certainly be an admirable goal or pursuit however!