The voice of the prophet is rarely is an easy one for us to receive and to heed within our lives.  Prophetic voices have a way of making us look at the self in a way that creates a feeling of discomfort, and it is a voice that pushes us to look deep within the self to recognize the ways in which we need to repent if we are to be in right relationship with God and with each other.  The prophetic voice is the voice of challenge to change our ways, to listen to the call of God, and to recognize the ways in which we fall short of living a Eucharistic life inspired by the grace of the Holy Spirit.

In today’s world, perhaps the most ubiquitous image of the self is increasingly going to online platforms that have been grouped into the category of social media.  Through this new medium we have the opportunity to present a particular view of ourselves to the world.  In essence, we are able to present a curated version of who we are as a person, and it is quickly becoming another way of how we define who we are as persons within the broader context of creation.  Through social media, we are able to share the glamour shots of our lives, the new events that are taking place, and the ways in which we are experiencing success.  Like no other time in history, we have the ability to create a public persona that speaks only to our strengths and highlights the very best part of ourselves to the public.  We are encouraged by these outlets to put more and more media of ourselves out for public consumption in order to get the “likes” that we need in order to grow followers on different platforms, to boost our self esteem through those likes, and to establish ourselves as people that are well connected precisely because of the number of friends or followers that we have on the different social media networks.  The pressure to become popular has morphed into something that now reaches across the nation and the world through the ubiquity of social media likes and follows.  Continue reading →