Having read both Tish Harrison Warren’s Liturgy of the Ordinary and Andy Crouch’s Tech-Wise Family, choose ONE of the following three films to watch: A Hidden Life (Terrence Malick, 2019), Of Gods and Men (Xavier Beauvois, 2010), or Into Great Silence (Philip Gröning, 2005); then write a 4-5-page reflection on the issues they raise. In particular, reflect on the one hand about the ways in which “withdrawal” is sometimes a faithful form of “engagement” with one’s culture, and on the other hand about the outsize role of technology in our lives today. How might ascetic practices—prayer, silence, sabbath, solitude, fasting, etc.—relate in creative, constructive, and critical ways to the dominant technological practices of our neighbors, families, schools, and churches? Conclude your reflection with a personal plan or program for your own life: your spiritual habits, your technological habits, and how you might coordinate them in an intentional manner governed first of all by God’s mission in and through the church.
