Sacred Cyberspaces. Catholicism, New Media, and the Religious Experience

Abstract

Each historical period presents a different challenge for religions. Among other conditioning factors, our time is profoundly marked by the mediation of our human relationships (and also relationship with the divine) through digital technologies. With this premise, Golan and Martini have written Sacred Cyberspaces, a book in which they analyze how digital communications are modifying the perceived authority and legitimacy of religions, especially Catholicism. The focus on this denomination is due to the challenges that it has been facing in recent decades. For the authors, the Catholic Church is trying to react to a crisis of identity and popularity caused by secularism and modernity, as well as by the emergence of relevant competitors (especially in Latin America). In doing so, after overcoming the reticence of some groups, it is using digital media in order to make itself relevant again. Scholars are interested in analyzing how that use is changing the status quo of influence and authority within the institution. This study is a further contribution to an area of study on religious communication called Digital Religion, dedicated to analyzing how digital tools and languages are shaping the religious human experience. In this case, Golan and Martini are focusing on how a specific Christian denomination, where tradition and hierarchy carry so much weight, is changing its attitude towards digital technologies and how their use is altering the balances of trust, power and relevance with regard to the faithful. The authors recount how, in 2014, they saw at a Christian religious ceremony in the Holy Land a priest broadcasting it from his phone for his community in Mexico. ‘Throughout the conversation, likes and hearts were popping up on his screen’ (4), they remember. This double liturgical presence, physical and virtual, so to speak, suggested to the authors the question about how the digital realm is changing the Catholic spiritual experience. What authority does the broadcaster have? What perception do the spectators have of the sacred place? What is the religious experience of the celebration like? How does it interfere with the audience present? Are the new forms of religious participation a game-changer in terms of socio-religious activity, or does the internet merely reproduce existing structures, theologies, and modes of devotee interaction? The book takes this question to areas as varied as official websites, Instagram, YouTube and apps.