Laudato Si 106-110 "A Tale of Two Jesuits: Pope Francis, Bernard Lonergan and the challenges of technology." By Liam Farrer

 In the previous section, Pope Francis was exploring our own struggles with the idea of power, and how it sometimes limits and takes over our existence, and worse, how it, along with technology has distorted our concept of what community, and care for others could be.  In paragraph 106-111, he continues his exploration  of the human experiment with technology and the gifts, but also the unhealthy paradigms that define its impact on our world. To help us with this reflection, our First guest blogger of the Late Spring, early Summer season, and a fellow Theobud of mine from Regis College in Toronto, Liam. Enjoy reading this great theological mind!  -Br. Dan

     Liam Farrer has just finished the first year of PhD 

coursework at Regis College and is currently studying 

languages for the same program. His areas of interest are 

medieval theology and modern Catholic theology. Most days 

he likes it. Liam is a native Calgarian, cradle Catholic and fan 

of Carmelite spirituality (and of the Musical 'Hamilton'. I had to add that one in! -Br. Dan-) . In his limited spare time he 

enjoys watching and playing baseball, reading Arthurian 

legends, watching movies, and reading comics. He also likes 

writing bios about himself.

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This past year I had the opportunity to take a year long doctoral seminar on a book called Insight by a Canadian Jesuit named Bernard Lonergan. For those of you who’ve never heard of Lonergan or Insight I can summarize it thusly: It is a big book that attempts to answer the question what am I doing when I am knowing and why is doing it knowing. There are two persistent myths about Insight, firstly that it’s purely a work of philosophy (on this point many Lonergan scholars disagree with me), and secondly that it’s not all that practical. The second point bothers me immensely and I am constantly trying to debunk it. My latest attempt at such was the term paper I wrote at the end of the aforementioned seminar which dealt with Lonergan’s notion of the concept of bias and how I felt that was present in the reaction by various Catholic groups to Amoris Laetitia. It was a gruelling task given that I began writing that paper the same day Amoris Laetitia was released and Francis gave a plane interview soon after I had completed my first draft, but I was happy to do it, and quite pleased with the results. Still when I had finished, I was looking forward to writing something on Pope Francis that didn’t have to do with bias. Then Br. Dan sent me the section I was supposed to be working on. God has a good sense of humour.

The bullet point version of one of Lonergan's ideas.  This is not irrelevant to our age as we grapple with abuse of power and improper use of technology,  but it's certainly hard to live!

             The response to Chapter Three of Laudato Si last summer was a perfect example of what Lonergan calls individual bias. Many people (although not enough to create a group per say) dug their heels’ in and said “Oh no Pope Francis’ now you’ve gone to far, you can tell me how to live my church life but you don’t know anything about science, I don’t need to follow this section.” (FYI: Jed Bush and Peter Cardinal Turkson has a morning long twitter war about it.) Bias had reared its ugly head again. So I decided to do something dangerous and assume that I could solve this problem logically. I asked myself what’s so controversial with suggesting that we go back to “being in tune with and respecting the possibilities offered by the things themselves (III.II.106).” Why shouldn’t we “receive what 

nature itself allowed, as if from its own hand” (Ibid).

Then I realized something. I don’t think the root of the opposition that people have that lead to this bias has anything to do with Francis’ supposed stance on climate change, or the fact that he is a Pope and not a scientist. I think it’s that deep down people know he’s right, but what he’s proposing they do is hard, so instead of attacking his ideas, the attack the person, and, irony of ironies, I think technology might be the cause for this.

  Pope Francis mentions that in the development of technology

the “subject (us) makes every effort to establish the scientific and

experimental method, which in itself is already a technique of

possession, mastery and transformation” (ibid.) This has been done, the Pope notes, very quickly and very efficiently, so much so that

“technology tends to absorb everything into its ironclad logic, and those who are surrounded with technology “know full well that it moves forward in the final analysis neither for profit nor for the well-being of the human race”, that “in the most radical sense of the term power is its motive – a lordship over all”.[87] As a result, “man seizes hold of the naked elements of both nature and human nature”.[88] Our capacity to make decisions, a more genuine freedom and the space for each one’s alternative creativity are diminished” (III.II.108). (editor's note: a poetic quote that is in fact

from the mind of Romano Guardini (1885-1968), a priest who is labelled by some as the Father of the New Evangelization)

Now I know what you’re thinking, I’m being melodramatic, after

all technology is extremely helpful. However, consider this scenario: 

My best friend is an graduate student in soil mechanics. He recently

 went on an expedition to Greece. He informed me that at one stop instead of taking in the beautiful Greek architecture many of the students  in their early twenties spent the entire time wandering around looking for a phone signal so they could get on Facebook. Now maybe you can argue that these kids wanted to post pictures of the aforesaid beautiful Greek architecture, but I would argue just why couldn’t it wait until they returned to the hotel that night. The counter argument I immediately perceive that  they don’t need to wait, we have the technology to allow it to happen instantly

 nowadays seems to prove the Pope’s point. Technology, under the guise of aiding us can in fact restrict our freedom. I for one am unfortunately, as of this moment suddenly intimately aware of how much time spent watching YouTube videos or Facebook messaging people while I walk to school could be spent watching the beauty of God’s creation in action, or praying for people. This however would require me to admit that I am allowing something created to dominate me, instead of trying to enter into

deeper communion with my creator, and that is hard. So it’s tempting to simply ignore this, to focus on the areas where one can make an argument, which I disagree with by the way, that the Pope may be overstepping, instead of dwelling on the fact that he’s may be right, that maybe my “life [is] gradually becom[ing] a surrender to situations conditioned by technology.” The baby can get thrown out with the bathwater, I can respectfully disagree without having to compromise my faith beliefs because faith and science aren’t compatible anyways, right (he said very sarcastically) and I can go on living my life as is.

  

Alternatively, I could take the hard way. I could attempt to engage

in what Lonergan calls the reversal of bias, by admitting that technology has become less of a tool and more of a trouble in my life. I could delete some apps, forgo the use of my headphones while walking, and horror of horrors turn my phone on silent when I’m with actual people. This realistically speaking will be hard, but I think I’m going to try. So here’s what I’m going to do. The Church, as I am sure you know, urges us to make extra sacrifices on Friday’s in honour of Our Lord’s Passion. So this June, the month of the Sacred Heart, I’m going to make reparation to the Sacred Heart by spending Friday’s using my phone as a phone. No emails, no apps, no internet, no unnecessary texts (if you have to ask if a text is necessary it probably isn’t), no music, just the phone itself and my

IBreviary, because I am a poor graduate student and am not going to buy a breviary just to use for three days. Your welcome to join me, or not, totally up to you. Thanks for reading and God bless you as you continue to work through Laudato si with this blog.