Social media ‘vitriol’ warning

In his latest address to the Provincial Council, Archbishop Foley Beach of the Anglican Church in North America has warned Christians, especially clergy, that they need to behave better on social media.

Noting that the pandemic has led to people’s fears, frustrations, anger, and concerns overflowing onto the streets and the internet, Archbishop Beach is most disconcerted by the vitriol and lack of Christian character displayed among Christians on social media. He insists that, as followers of Jesus, we should be appalled by the broad labelling, assumptions, and condemning of whole groups of people, together with the mean and personal attacks on individuals.

It is one thing for unbelievers to put one another down, to cancel each other, and to treat others without respect and dignity, but there is no excuse for believers to do this, especially clergy.

We are, he says ‘falling short; horribly short. We are accountable before God for our words, whether spoken or written. Too many of our clergy are emoting rather than speaking with wisdom and thinking critically. We are supposed to be cultural thought-leaders, or at least attempting to be. I read so many angry tweets or responses to something in the news that were basically reflecting a non-critical repetition of what the media already said. Without doing any homework or research, people are emoting and reacting, many times in complete ignorance of the facts, through their tweets and comments on social platforms.

‘Worse, if we disagree with these emotional and uncritical comments, we are condemned, attacked and cancelled; that is, written off as not worthy of fellowship. This raises another question: why do we think we are so important that we need to be publicly commenting anyway? Have we become so self-important and so self-aggrandising that we think the world cannot live without our comments on every issue presented to us by the secular news media?

‘Don’t hear me wrong. I am not trying to shut down social media. I am not trying to shut down discussion and dialogue. I am trying to address our witness for Jesus on social media, and frankly, it is appalling. How can we expect others to want to follow Jesus when His followers are not following Him, but rather are following their own egos?’