{"id":3154,"date":"2026-10-23T01:26:00","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T01:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/?p=3154"},"modified":"2026-10-23T22:10:57","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T22:10:57","slug":"letter-to-the-editor-jesus-calls-us-to-digital-maximalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/2026\/10\/23\/letter-to-the-editor-jesus-calls-us-to-digital-maximalism\/","title":{"rendered":"Letter to the Editor: Jesus calls us to digital maximalism"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Rev. Dr. Timothy Rosenberger<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
(Soundtrack)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cVery little of your digital technology is optimized for your flourishing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So said Grove City College philosophy professor Christopher Franklin, as The Collegian reported on Oct. 9 (\u201cProf promotes digital minimalism\u201d). His prescription is a 30-day fast with no social media, no phone alarm and no Google Maps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The instinct is an old and honorable one. Christians have fasted from good things since the desert fathers, and Professor Franklin plainly cares about the students he watches walking down the stairs with their eyes on their screens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, digital minimalism is not a fast. It is a creed, and I would call it the gospel of subtraction. It holds that the good life begins with the question of how much is just enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It gets the disease wrong. The late Stanford scholar Ren\u00e9 Girard, who came to the Christian faith through his study of great novels, showed that most of our desires are borrowed. We want what we see others want, and the people we imitate soon become our rivals. When those rivalries grow unbearable, the crowd finds someone to blame and expels him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The feed is that crowd, open all night. Delete it for 30 days and you have not left it. You have only stopped watching, and your rivals will be waiting for you on day 31. Blaming the phone is what crowds have always done. The machine is a perfect scapegoat because it cannot answer back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also gets the cure wrong. Christ never asked how much was just enough. He turned water into well over a hundred gallons of wine and fed 5,000 men with 12 baskets to spare. He sent the twelve out to heal the sick, raise the dead and cast out devils (Matthew 10:8). Then he promised that those who believed in him would do greater works than his (John 14:12).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He meant it, and we have started. A stranger with a defibrillator brings a man back from death on a sidewalk. In Lausanne, Switzerland, a man paralyzed for over a decade walked again through an implant that carries his thoughts past the break in his spine. Children going blind from an inherited disease have begun to see again through gene therapy. Drugs first made for diabetes are being tested against addiction, and early results suggest they quiet the cravings that hold men in bondage. With superintelligence we can go much farther, toward the dead raised and the demons cast out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A gospel that promises peace and safety in exchange for a smaller life should give any reader of Paul pause (1 Thessalonians 5:3). Christ promised something larger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He does not call us to digital minimalism. He calls us to greater works, with every tool we can build to do them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The answer to minimalism is maximalism, and a new era of Christ\u2019s miracles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Build it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Rev. Dr. Timothy Rosenberger \u201cVery little of your digital technology is optimized for your flourishing.\u201d So said Grove City College philosophy professor Christopher Franklin, as The Collegian reported on Oct. 9 (\u201cProf promotes digital minimalism\u201d). His prescription is a 30-day fast with no social media, no phone alarm and no Google Maps. The instinct […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":3205,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[217],"tags":[280,262,29],"class_list":["post-3154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-letters-to-the-editor","tag-letter-to-the-editor","tag-oct-23-2026-edition","tag-perspectives"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4.webp",1536,1024,false],"thumbnail":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4-150x150.webp",150,150,true],"medium":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4-300x200.webp",300,200,true],"medium_large":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4-768x512.webp",768,512,true],"large":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4-1024x683.webp",1024,683,true],"1536x1536":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4.webp",1536,1024,false],"2048x2048":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/image-4.webp",1536,1024,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"puruckermt24","author_link":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/author\/puruckermt24\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Rev. Dr. Timothy Rosenberger \u201cVery little of your digital technology is optimized for your flourishing.\u201d So said Grove City College philosophy professor Christopher Franklin, as The Collegian reported on Oct. 9 (\u201cProf promotes digital minimalism\u201d). His prescription is a 30-day fast with no social media, no phone alarm and no Google Maps. The instinct…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3154"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3154\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3396,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3154\/revisions\/3396"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}