The Pope Says…
At the end of the year, there are so many lists and conversations about resolutions, change, and of course, we are moving into a new decade.
This popped into my feed on 12/30.
Pope Francis urged us to talk to each other during meals instead of using our phones, per Reuters.
Jesus, Mary and Joseph “prayed, worked and communicated with each other,” the pope said in St. Peter’s Square during his weekly Angelus address.
“I ask myself if you, in your family, know how to communicate. Or are you like those kids at meal tables where everyone is chatting on their mobile phone … where there is silence like at a Mass but they don’t communicate?”
We watched The Two Popes at the end of the year too. A worthy movie about Pope Benedict XVI and the shifting of the tides with the next Pope, Pope Francis. This is the moment when the Catholic Church began to move from holding on to the conservative past with attempting to move into the future. After all, they have one huge impact on the globe regardless of what one thinks about religion.
I love that Pope Francis is telling families to put down their cell phones when they eat. There is something insane to me when you sit down with people to eat and they are more interested in what is happening in the outside world, or themselves, that they can not be present at a meal. Even if nobody says anything, eventually conversation will take place.
There are just some things that should never change. Sitting down for a meal, focusing on the meal, and the people around you. We can’t disincentives ourselves from being human beings.
Comments (Archived):
I loved the Two Popes. Such a smart movie. The dialogues between the two Popes were riveting to me. Hopkins and Pryce were amazing in their roles. Jonathan Pryce even looked so much like Pope Francis. I wished he had won a Globe last Sunday.
So glad we saw it
The underlying point is largely correct [1] even if it’s coming from someone who honestly is very out of touch with modern society and is an ‘old white dude’ who has never had children or a family of his own. And as Fred and others would say is ‘talking his game’.And I mean how is this a relevant way to make the point with a widespread intended audience???”Jesus, Mary and Joseph “prayed, worked and communicated with each other,”Separately speaking of religion I went to a Quaker High School (but I am jewish). Meeting for Worship was way more valuable than anything I ever did in synagogue. People would just get up randomly and say shit. If you wanted you could close your eyes and do nothing. Super interesting to see people just talking what was on their mind. No comparison (the way I saw it) to repeating what I considered (and still do) ‘stupid prayers’. This was years ago obviously.Religion is about control and the Pope and all religious leaders are losing control. That is (make no mistake) why there is change (other than in those repressed societies where religion rules).Separately I learned something new today. I was going to say ‘and has never even been with a woman’ but I am wrong about that:https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…This is not a strike against Christianity. I have no love for the extreme religion of any kind even Judaism (Ultra Orthodox Jewry as one example).[1] I would also say that it’s not the use of the phone so much as what is being done with the phone. A phone can be used to spark conversation imagine if you simply told children to spend a few minutes and turn up something interesting and then ‘we will discuss’. Then it would a benefit rather than ‘how was school today’ or ‘your aunt is sick and in the hospital’ or ‘let’s talk about the war overseas’. We watched the news every night at dinner. Not a stupid sitcom but the local and national news. Sparked a great deal of conversation. Learned from that for sure. Simply saying ‘no tv at dinner’ would not have been better.
Violence and the Sacred, Rene Girard. Fascinating theory on human development, ritual, religion, culture, institutions and the modern world.
Haven’t seen Two Popes yet.Decided to rewatch a few seasons of Sopranos which was beyond great and just finished.Top of list for later tonight possibly.
Agree with him on that. Disagree with his views on economics which are very socialistic.
Appetite (food) and desire (web) being satisfied in the same place at the same time. That is indigestion. Perhaps the Vatican should launch a fund to develop apps for this sort of problem. It definitely has the financial resources to do it.
SHERRY TURKLE: “Studies of conversation both in the laboratory and in natural settings show that when two people are talking, the MERE PRESENCE of a phone on a table between them or in the periphery of their vision changes both what they talk about and the degree of connection they feel. People keep the conversation on topics where they won’t mind being interrupted. They don’t feel as invested in each other. Even a silent phone disconnects us.”https://www.nytimes.com/201…
Good one.What we need is technology that compliments rather than substitutes. The Pavlovian phone is a dog.