"Instead I hope to come to you and talk face to face, so that our joy may be complete" (2 John 12).
If I had to pick one thing from Laudato Si' by Pope Francis, it would be this paragraph:
"Real relationships with others, with all the challenges they entail, now tend to be replaced by a type of internet communication which enables us to choose or eliminate relationships at whim, thus giving rise to a new type of contrived emotion which has more to do with devices and displays than with other people and with nature. Today's media do enable us to communicate and to share our knowledge and affections. Yet at times they also shield us from direct contact with the pain, the fears and the joys of others and the complexity of their personal experiences. For this reason, we should be concerned that, alongside the exciting possibilities offered by these media, a deep and melancholic dissatisfaction with interpersonal relations, or a harmful sense of isolation, can also arise."
In other words, alongside the blessing of electronic communication is the risk of losing out on meaningful face to face relationships with those near to us. Thanks to Holy Communion, we have and enjoy a flesh and blood relationship with our Lord. And this should lead and inspire us to want the same with each other. So God bless you as you reach out electronically, but never forgetting that this is no substitute for truly being with your spouse, children, family, neighbor, and fellow Christians. If anything, we need to invest more, much more, in these real relationships. And the real blessings await!
