As you read the title of this article, you maybe nodded your head. You likely agree with the sentiment that we as a society need to be vigilant about our media consumption, especially around the election news cycle. Yes, maintaining interior peace is something that we as Christians ought to prioritize.
But let me ask you something: In the brief moments of engaging with this article thus far, did you note that maybe YOU need to maybe change some of YOUR media consumption habits?
Maybe not, and that is why I posit that the foundational virtue that all of us need this election cycle is humility. It takes humility to honestly engage with the questions I will pose in this article. It takes great humility to acknowledge that the media I consume is perhaps negatively affecting my interiority, and even greater humility to intentionally monitor and possibly alter my consumption habits, but that’s precisely what I encourage us to do.
Let’s take a step back: Maybe you are concerned about the election, but you don’t see what the big deal is. You may say “It’s a naturally tense time that will inevitably upset us a bit, but it’ll be over soon…”
Listen to the words of Our Holy Father in his new Encyclical, published just this month. He’s writing of the difficult contemporary state of our world. More than this, I think he’s talking about you and me. Listen to him speak about the state of your heart:
We find ourselves immersed in societies of serial consumers who live from day to day, dominated by the hectic pace and bombarded by technology, lacking in the patience needed to engage in the processes that an interior life by its very nature requires. In contemporary society, people “risk losing their center, the center of their very selves”. “Indeed, the men and women of our time often find themselves confused and torn apart, almost bereft of an inner principle that can create unity and harmony in their lives and actions”… No room is left for the heart.[1]
If we continually make little compromises with our interiority, we risk losing our very selves. If we are serious about being men and women of prayer, the preservation of peace in our heart is of primary importance. As someone who is in a period of life actively discerning God’s will- peace, attentiveness to the movements of my heart, and silence are all essential. But these tools are not just integral to priestly discernment, they are essential to hearing the voice of the Lord and receiving the love of the Lord in your heart. That’s vital for all of us.
In this article I present four questions for reflection, (hopefully) infused with some lessons and wisdom from my years in seminary. Things that you probably already know, yet nonetheless may stand to benefit from reflecting on.
1. What is the nature of the relationship between the media I consume and I?
Media outlets (including the ones that espouse your views) are interested in generating revenue, mainly through subscriptions and ad revenue. This is not a condemnation of them, nor is it to say that they are all bankrupt of journalistic integrity, just a note on the reality of how they work. Knowing this reminds me to approach all news media with a grain of salt. The outlet that published the article (while they may have good intentions of sharing truth), are not primarily concerned with the well-being of your soul, they are also trying to make money. The relationship between you and the media you consume is that of a seller and consumer, thus there is always an ever lingering ulterior motives to look out for.
An emotionally flustered consumer is an easy exploitable consumer. Media entities know this just as well as marketers. A frightened panicked consumer is prone to consume more media to try to find out a solution. This holds true for any corporate entity, as it is well known that advertisements that appeal to emotions are consistently highly efficacious. In our news media today, there are of course blatant examples of fear mongering that are easy to spot, but this can be very subtle too. A fruitful (and fun) exercise can be to read some news articles closely, reading in between the lines to discern the intent behind them, the emotional response the author is attempting to produce. Even the way just a few sentences are phrased can sometimes belay these motives.
2. Did consuming this media increase my faith, hope, and love?
You may object or contest that this question is overly simplistic. “Are you saying I should simply be naïve and only consume media that makes me feel good?” Of course not. I’m not advocating that we be ignorant to the very real dangers and bad news that surrounds us. Notice the focus of the examination is not about the media itself, but on your own reaction. This question has everything to do with being an intentional vigilant observer of the movements of your heart. I oftentimes read news that arouses an anger. What matters is what I do with that anger. Do I pause to examine that anger? Sometimes an angry response can be a great start to a passionate intercessory prayer. It is thus possible that an angry reaction can lead to increased hope, or perhaps the anger itself is indicative of a great love. Do I stop to acknowledge that love, or am I consumed only in rage?
Stopping to ask these questions is essential. If we’re being honest, many of us are probably guilty of omitting this examination, allowing anger fester and make us jaded. Again, here we see our foundational principle of humility again. If you are noticing that you go to bed feeling less love in your heart due to what you are consuming, maybe you need to have a very frank discussion with yourself as to your tolerance level with regards to the news you consume.
3. Am I doing something in response?
As someone who can tend to be an over thinker, I can’t stress enough the importance of this. I truly believe that we are not meant to consume all the world’s news in the way that we do. Too often I can think about just how big the problems are that I induce a sort of anxious paralysis where I am so caught up in the vastness of the problem that I forget to take one simple step towards the good in the work that is right in front of me.
Dorothy Day reflects elegantly on this common sense wisdom. “we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time; we can be responsible only for the one action of the present moment. But we can beg for an increase of love in our hearts that will vitalize and transform all our individual actions, and know that God will take them and multiply them, as Jesus multiplied the loaves and fishes.”[2]
One step at a time is a crucial maxim to remember, but there are deeper questions here: Do I see myself as a part of the solution? Can I actually do anything to help the world’s situation? These are supremely important questions. Because we can do something. Something real and meaningful. In fact, our Catholic Christian faith tells us that we can do something astonishingly powerful. We can unite our sufferings and little sacrifices to Christ’s, thereby taking the situation of what’s in front of us and actively uniting it with Christ’s sacrifice on Calvary, thus including and absorbing the ills of the world into Christ’s redeeming action.
A great example of this is the day of reparation we had this month in response to the sacrilegious mockery of theEucharist in Atlanta. There was a real very grave evil that took place. Did we throw up our hands in despair? No, we operated in hope. Did we merely offer up some prayers? No, we worked. We made little reparations and thus did something that had meaningful effect in consoling our Lord and participating in His redemption. With every problem or injustice in the world, there is opportunity as the body of Christ, to join our reparations with Jesus, and thus become co-redeemers of the world. Nothing we do could be more powerful.
4. Who am I listening to? Who ought I listen to?
This last question requires little explanation. There is the old maxim that looking at how you spend the hours of your day will reveal what you really care about. Something similar can be said regarding who/what you listen to during the day. One exercise I encourage everyone to do would be for every news article you read, read a chapter of the gospel. If we consume news for an hour, how much of our time and attention do we give the Lord to speak to us? If we consume politics twice as much as we do scripture, why are we surprised when we are disquieted and unable to see God truly at work before us? The Lord wants to speak to us. Every single book of scripture is a result of God’s self-revelation to us. He really wants to speak with you. He wants to be in dialogue with you the whole day. He wants to hear your worries and concerns. He wants you to take solace in Him. If only we choose today to come, listen to the voice of the Lord.
[1] Francis, Encyclical Letter Dilexit Nos (2024), no 9, accessed October 26, 2024, Dilexit nos (24 October 2024) | Francis.
[2] Dorothy Day, The Reckless Way of Love: Notes on Following Jesus,Plough Publishing House: (New York: 2017).
