Virtual Communion. Katherine G. Schmidt
(or insisting upon) responsible and moral media consumption. One is tempted to characterize these texts as antiquated moral pronouncements that reflect a nostalgic yearning for a time when the church was a cultural and political force which could insist upon the “objective moral order” as the standard for all media production. But within these texts emerges a distinctly theological account of these media and their concomitant technologies, especially in Miranda Prorsus. Before attending to the moral questions of any particular medium, Pius XII writes, “From the drawings and inscriptions of the most ancient times down to the latest technical devices, all instruments of human communication inevitably have as their aim, the lofty purpose of revealing men as in some way the assistants of God.”24 One can see the germ of this theological understanding of media technologies in Pius XI, who writes that “the essential purpose of art, its raison d’etre, is to assist in the perfection of the moral personality.”25 While Pius XII continued this emphasis on the relationship between media and morality, he furthered the theological basis for it by including a more detailed account of how the media actually work and of their relationship to a theological anthropology:
Among the various technical arts which transmit the ideas of men those occupy a special place today, as We said, which communicate as widely as possible news of all kinds to ears and eyes by means of sounds and pictures. This manner of spreading pictures and sounds, so far as the spirit is concerned is supremely adapted to the nature of men, as Aquinas says: ‘But it is natural to man to come to things of the understanding through things of sense; for all our knowledge has its origin in a sense.’ Indeed, the sense of sight, as being more noble and honorable than other sense, more easily leads to a knowledge of spiritual things.26
What this captures, even at such an early date in the influence of these various media, is the degree to which communications technology are part of the economy of grace. The wisdom of these papal statements is that while they understand such media to be “instruments,” they do not argue for their inherent neutrality. Instead, they recognized the way in which their existence actually tells us something about what it means to be human, specifically what it means to be made in the image of God. This emphasis is hard to find in contemporary theological engagements with the internet. There is an implicit and sometimes explicit assumption that the internet and its culture is somewhat of an aberration, something separate from what we might call “religious” or “Christian.” Consequently, the practical recommendations from a Christian perspective seek to add to online life, searching for ways to carve out a distinctly Christian space within cyberspace. In contrast, these ecclesial perspectives challenge us to engage in discourse that situates media—presumably to include the internet—within the very fabric of the created universe, as a vital part of human history and culture, and even a mediator of “spiritual things.”
Therefore, one can argue that a deeply incarnational theology, while not explicit, undergirds these early ecclesial perspectives on media. By taking on human flesh, God has redeemed the world and made it possible for even the most banal aspects of creation to participate in the economy of grace. This is the incarnational theology on which the sacramental life is based. These documents are more explicit in explaining the place of the church in their particular cultural situations with regard to media. On the level of the church universal, the documents reflect an optimism about the relationship between the church and the rest of society that is difficult to maintain in our hyper-pluralistic culture today. On the level of the local church community, much emphasis is placed on the roles of bishops and priests to affect the media consumption of average Catholics. An example of this local effort would be the Pledge to stay away from immoral films. At the time of their writing, these documents could insist upon such cultural influence on the part of the church precisely because of the thick parish communities in which people lived. As the century progressed, ecclesial perspectives on media and communications would continue to point out both the positives and negatives of media. They would also more explicitly draw upon an incarnational perspective for their understanding of communications itself. With regard to church, they would continue to make suggestions for the diocesan and parish levels, but would extend the ecclesial vision of Miranda Prorsus by emphasizing the role of the media in the themes of the common good and solidarity.
Conciliar and Post-Conciliar Ecclesial Perspectives
A mere six years after Miranda Prorsus, the Second Vatican Council produced Inter Mirifica, the Decree on the Means of Social Communication. This document is important for several reasons. First, it introduces the phrase “social communications,” which is an acknowledgment of the relative insufficiency of “media” or “mass media.” This is immensely helpful for applying its ideas to current technologies like the internet.27 Secondly, it establishes a World Day of Communications,28 which becomes an annual occasion for the current pope to give some commentary, however brief, on the issue of communications technology. Thirdly, it ensures that social communications will remain a focus for the church by proposing a “special office of the Holy See” on the topic. This will later become the Pontifical Commission for Social Communications, responsible for some of the most important (and theologically rich) ecclesial commentary on media and communications to date.
Despite these developments, Inter Mirifica remains, in the words of John O’Malley, “virtually forgotten.”29 Discussion of the decree was remarkably short and “many felt that the council was wasting its time discussing mass communications.”30 Even by those who did not share this view, the final document was not entirely well received. Three American journalists—John Cogley (Commonweal), Robert Kaiser (Time and Life), and Michael Novak (The New Republic)—released a statement calling the document “hopelessly abstract” and one “that may be cited as a classic example of how the Second Vatican Council failed to come to grips with the world around it.”31 One way to interpret the place of the decree in the context of the council as a whole is that it is an early product of the council and as such, does not reflect the characteristic “voice” of later documents.32 Specifically, while the title of the document reflects an “openness and wonder,” the document itself “seems at times more like a laying down of rules.”33
Admitting obvious differences in tone from later conciliar documents, it is important to note that Inter Mirifica begins with an optimistic statement not unlike those found in the other documents produced by the Second Vatican Council: “Man’s genius has, with God’s help, produced marvelous technical inventions from creation, especially in our times.”34 What follows is a sort of “updated” version of the cautious tone of Miranda Prorsus and Vigilanti Cura. The church is aware of the possibilities of social communications, “but the Church also knows that man can use them in ways that are contrary to the Creator’s design and damaging to himself.”35 Unlike Miranda Prorsus, which is organized by type of media, Inter Mirifica focuses on what the drafters have deemed to be the most relevant aspects of these media for social communications: information, art and the moral law, public opinion, and the role of civil authorities. The document continues the focus of its predecessors on morality to the media that are its subject, but does more to outline the creative possibilities of the media in question. The document expresses great confidence in the role of information in the modern world: “If news or facts and happenings is communicated publicly and without delay, every individual will have permanent access to sufficient information and thus will be enabled to contribute effectively to the common good.”36
The document goes on to establish the absolute primacy of the objective moral order, which is “superior to and is capable of harmonizing all forms of human activity, not excepting art, no matter how noble in themselves.”37 Once again, we might be tempted to move quickly past such pronouncements as woefully nostalgic of a time and place when and where the church had social capital to exercise such authority; pluralism, among other cultural dynamisms, has long precluded such influence. However, there is an interesting assumption at work in this section of the document. Instead of sequestering media to a realm of neutrality from which the church can then pull for its own uses, it is quite clear here that the church sees all of human activity within the purview of its moral care. The language that Inter Mirifica uses here is notably stronger than earlier ecclesial statements. The council fathers write, “It is the Church’s birthright to use and own any of these media