Have we been programmed by our use of media, especially television and radio?
This question is not to ask about how our values and world views may have been affected by these media, but how our communication practices may have been.
When we consume, we don't have to respond. We watch. We listen. Most of us do not make an effort to engage the actors and other on-air personalities.
Does this carry over to our other communications?
When I "consume" the communications of a friend, colleague, or acquaintance, do I consistently respond? This is the question that I wrestled with during the hour it took me to return to my office after lunch with a friend yesterday. My friend had asked me if I ever received responses from certain offices with whom he and I have attempted to make connection by use of e-mails and phone calls.
Back in the office I looked at the list of e-mails that had arrived during the time I was out. In addition to the spam, I saw one I had not expected from a friend and colleague in ministry. I opened it. It was a simple "Thank You." It was his response to an e-mail I had sent several colleagues containing attachments about coming events.
The question that my lunch conversation generated became more pressing. This "Thank You" was from one of the busiest colleagues I sent the general e-mail to. Of all those who could have chosen not to respond even with clicking on "reply", typing "Thank You" and clicking on "Send" --- thus taking a few precious moments of his time --- he could have made the best case to not do so. But, he didn't. He responded. He made a deeper connection with me.
Am I asking to receive a "Thank You" to all my general e-mails? No. But I am asking, do we respond to others' reaching out to us --- who are trying to make a connection with us --- as we do television and other media? How do we treat others in their attempts to make connection with us?
Does the rapid pace, the multiple multi-taskings we are ever sacrificing ourselves to, allow us to ignore those who have reached out to us as if their attempt to communicate with us is one of those many impersonal broadcasts we consume each day?
So many responsibilities! So many people! So few hours! So busy! Has this litany - repeated in some way by most of us - been our telling connection to others. That is, do we tell others by our lack of response that we do not want a connection with them?
In other words, are we hear to consume and be consumed or to serve?
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