From Friends Journal – A Case for Plain, Tech-Free Worship
In the spring of 2021, my husband and I began worshiping at our meetinghouse for outside worship on the porch with a small group who had begun to trickle back. For a year, we had been online worship stalwarts: teaching others how to use the technology and showing up multiple times a week for community and to support those who were quarantined at home, alone, for so much time…. That it felt nothing like in-person worship seemed beside the point: online worship was the only option, and nothing in life was as it had been, anyway. It was a very stressful time for all of us.
So when we arrived at worship a bit late for our third First Day back on the porch, we were delighted, at first, to see so many loved ones joining us: there were lots of us there! Yay! Since my family had arrived uncharacteristically late, I kept my eyes lowered shyly, and we made our way to an open bench. I watched to make sure that my husband and his service dog were settled, and then I sat up and looked up. Right in front of me, blocking my view, was one of several electronic devices with cameras pointing at worshipers, set up to project our images to those at home who were joining remotely.
I had a big, immediate, and unexpected reaction to the presence of those smartphones in meeting for worship. I left worship and fled to sob in the car. The in-person worship I had longed for, the experience I hoped would help us begin to heal from the pandemic disconnection, was being watched from afar by other people.