Technology and Communion Part 1: My Social Media Addiction (2024)

In this first Substack series, I’d like to examine the connection between social media techologies and how Christians understand communion. In many ways, social media mimics communion, which is why it is so highly addictive. In Part I, I will share my own story and how I sought communion through social media, which years later I discovered was a lie.

I first encountered social media through MySpace around 2006. I had just gotten out of the Navy and was working for a cable and internet call center in my home town of Billings, Montana while finishing up my undergraduate degree. MySpace was all the rage. Everyone started with one friend: Tom. The social media platform allowed users to create their own backgrounds, load music, post photos and thoughts, and to connect with others. I spent hours loading new backgrounds and music every few days.

By 2008, everyone was switching over to Facebook. It did not have the personalization options MySpace had, but for some reason it became the primary social media platform that would dominate for years, especially in my age group. I am 43. The opportunity for connection between individuals, groups, news, and marketing created a powerhouse and highly addictive force. In fact, it was these connections that drew me in right away.

My closest friend at the time was heavily involved in Republican state politics and the use of social media for political platforms was almost immediate. At the time, I was wandering far from Christ, so politics became the god in my life. Deep down I genuinely thought politics could save us somehow. This is why politics so easily becomes a false idol.

I spent countless hours posting political news stories and debating friends of different political positions. It often did not end well and those first few years of Facebook I lost a lot of friends and family. I’d lose even more when I reverted back to the Faith in 2009 and could no longer support issues like same sex marriage, IVF, and others.

During that time, and for years, social media gave me a sense of belonging. As someone who greatly enjoys intellectual pursuits and discussions, it made me feel like I belonged to an intellectual group. When I interned at The Heritage Foundation in 2009, we were encouraged to use social media platforms to share articles and blogs written by the think tank. I even got to write a few blogs as a defense intern. It was clear early on that social media was meant to be a tool for political agendas. We see this now in the deep polarization of our country that has been manufactured and perpetuated through the use of social media platforms.

It was during my time interning at The Heritage Foundation that I began to revert back to my Catholic Faith. The false idol of politics was replaced by the True God after I experienced the Sacred Triduum at the Nation Shrine of the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception. I encountered the Living God in the Mass in a dramatic and profound way that changed me forever. I knew He was truly Present in the Mass.

My growing discontent with the zero sum game of politics and the reduction of human beings to faceless numbers that I encountered in many congressional staff members led me to abandon a future career in politics. There were quite literally moments when congressional staff members would talk about human beings—especially service members—as expendable numbers. It turned my stomach. There are others who are much more cut out for trudging through the sludge than myself. Instead, I found myself drawn to theological topics and 9 years later would finish a Master’s degree in Theology.

There was one aspect of social media that kept me hooked in my post-political days. The idea of connection. As my interest in politics lessened and I became an independent because I saw the Republican Party abandoning Christian moral teaching on marriage and family, the lies of the two wars my family served in, and the corruption in both parties, I turned my focus to topics pertaining to the Church. Years later, I now know Church politics can actually be worse, but I didn’t realize this until 2018 and beyond. My Facebook feed became a daily news wire for all things Catholic.

I spent hours discussing Church politics and teachings. I lost friends—both Catholic and non-Catholic—because I no longer supported same sex marriage or relationships that did not conform to Christ’s calling in our lives. The former was the most contentious issue I encountered, especially among young people in the Church who wanted to see Church teaching change. They did not understand that the Church’s teachings are God’s not man’s, something many in the hierarchy do not seem to understand either, so it wasn’t entirely the fault of these young people who were never led to the truth. I didn’t realize all of this at the time.

As is so often the case with social media, we all started canceling one another. De-friending became the way to teach one another a lesson. Something I also participated in with ease. None of us realized what this was doing to us and our relationships with one another as a society. Social media has become a hotbed of wrath, intolerance (in the true sense of the word), and outright hatred towards those who do not agree with us. Reasoned and charitable debate—especially in Catholic circles—is rare. I found myself spending years on this roller coaster of anger and vengeance.

Like most people behind a computer screen, there were many times I was much too blunt and lacked charity and gentleness with those who were struggling or who did not understand. Social media gave me an ego boost that was spiritually dangerous, but I was too addicted to see it at the time. I was filled with self-rightous indignation that wasn’t holy righteous anger. It was the deeply insidious and destructive sin of pride.

I became obsessed with posting. I took countless photos to share, posted updates many times a day, and checked my phone or computer every few minutes. I had become Pavlov’s dog in human form and the ding on my phone was my “meal time.” I am not alone. This is what social media is doing to countless people. We justify our behavior because everyone else is doing it. We have to feed our addiction with content and our opinion on everything. We have given our lives over to a virtual unreality rather than live the sometimes monotonous and painful reality before us.

At this point, I was married and had our daughter, who is our only child. We have five with Our Lord. My husband saw how destructive social media was for me early in our marriage. He saw how it impacted my mood, increased anxiety, and led me to ignore my family and responsibilities in favor of this “connection”.

Being a stay-at-home mom this day-in-age is highly isolating and lonely. Since our culture has abandoned community in favor of atomization there were—and still are—many days I will spend speaking to no adults, or since my daughter is now in a hybrid homeschool, no one. The loneliness was unbearable (and still is at times)—especially for someone with an intellectual mind—so I fell deeper and deeper into the addiction.

I felt torn the whole time. There were many moments when the Holy Spirit would show me what I was doing. My daughter would be sitting in front of me while I had been scrolling for minutes or hours. She was growing up and I was missing it. My iPhone was more important to me than her. I remember these times with great shame and regret. When I would take her to the library, I would see other mothers who were engrossed in their phones. It was a reflection of me. It cut me to the core, but I would find myself drowning in social media again and again.

The Lord in His mercy was working on conversion deep within my soul each time I saw what I was doing. He began to show me how what I desired, which was communion with Him and others, could not be truly found in social media. This desire for connection was placed in my heart by Him, but social media is a lie. It is a counterfeit. It disconnects us from one another. We are body and soul. This means any form of community that cuts off the body—technology does this—can never be a full form of communion. Authentic communion requires our presence. Social media is a shadow at best and a counterfeit at worst.

By 2019 and 2020, I began to cut back my social media use. I felt like a veil had been lifted from my eyes and I couldn’t unsee the truth that social media is driving us further away from one another rather than closer together. We no longer call one another to catch up, as imperfect as the phone may be. We don’t see each other as much in person because we figure we already know what is going on based on someone’s social media feed. We are “together” in social media, so why put in the effort required for authentic relationships of charity and sacrifice? What a lie! A best hits reel is a false picture of what is going on in most people’s lives.

As Christians we are called to communion with Christ and one another. This communion requires our physcial presence. This is why online Masses do not fulfill the Sunday obligation. The Lord wants to reach us body and soul through His Word and the Holy Eucharist. He wants us to reach one another in the same way. I don’t Zoom in to visit the sick at the hospital each month. I enter their rooms and their suffering through my presence. This is authentic communion.

Countless individuals are living in the darkness of loneliness because we have abandoned true communion. Stay-at-home moms, sick, elderly, children, and others have locked themselves away in social media land only to find themselves anxiety ridden and isolated. Youth have higher rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide. Everyone knows social media is to blame, but nobody wants to show them there is another way. We are too addicted ourselves. We are raising kids who will be incapable of authentic communion because they have spent their lives on screens rather than looking into the eyes of others.

I will tackle in greater detail what social media, AI, and other technologies are doing to communion. My own family is still battling against the ease of technology to soothe suffering. We haven’t mastered it, yet. I deleted Facebook and Instagram in 2020 and 2021. I don’t regret it for a moment and I don’t miss it. I still find myself in YouTube or Pinterest rabbit holes at times. In moments of illness and suffering I binge watch television much too much, but by God’s grace, I can at least see what all of this is doing to us as human beings. I am a writer, so there is always a tension between my words and the digital format being shared on social media platforms.

Slowly, Our Lord is helping me to understand that what I long for is ultimately Him and the communion we are made for with one another. We long for connection because He made us to be social beings, but we can’t find this connection through an impersonal and cold device in our hands. This is why certain technologies are so powerful. They are counterfeits of the real thing and a powerful force in our lives that is often used for ill by nefarious forces at work if we are not careful or even aware of this fact.

Next time I will examine how social media mimics the communion we are called to.

A happy and blessed Easter season to all!