Consumerism, Christian Discipleship and the Digital Age

What follows is a post I recently wrote for my Christian Discipleship in a Consumer Society journal, a semester-long assignment regularly making entries for a course at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, where I'm currently in my last year of a Masters of Divinity program. It's definitely just a bit of free-form, unedited thinking, but I'd love to hear what you think.

So I've been thinking a great deal about the many concepts we've talking about in the course so far, and given that we're almost halfway through the semester, I figured I'd try to articulate my thinking thus far. This won't be pretty, it's just a lot of raw, stream of conscious writing, but here we go...

Throughout the semester something's been hanging on me a bit... I sort of had a general notion that things were changing, that the advent of a variety of web 2.0 platforms and especially social media was revolutionizing how we identify ourselves, what we desire, and how we define ourselves. In other words, I thought social media was changing many of the factors involved in what we create and how we can consume... yet, I could never really articulate what I was trying to get at.

Last week, when discussing Pastor's Zandstra's article "30-cent Deal of a Lifetime," what I was trying to get at became a bit clearer. A major argument of Pastor Zandstra's piece was that we don't primarily purchase/ consume commodities because we desire the physical object, but rather that we desire a certain identity that various commodities signal to others (and ourselves). Essentially, for many millennials, and increasingly folks of older generations as well, Pastor Zandstra's apt observation no longer holds true. With social media revolutionizing the way we identify ourselves and the way we make meaning, a decreasing percentage of the commodities many younger folks buy has very much to do with identity at all. Sure, if I ever buy brand new clothes (I usually just thrift shop), its at LL Bean, primarily so I can return the commodities I purchase once they wear out, but also because the whole woodsy Maine thing is a part of the identity I've constructed for myself. A Facebook profile is such a stronger, more interactive way of signaling identity though, so if my online persona greatly contradicted the whole woodsy thing, folks would probably think of me more based more upon what they see online. In this way (and its only one of two ways I've so far identified), purchasing commodities of a specific brand is increasingly less important in constructing an identity for one's self.

I just analyzed my own spending over the past month in order to provide some factual evidence to back up this idea. Here's the categories I spent on:

- Rent: 26%
- Food: 22%
- Entertainment (mostly beer & concert tickets): 16%
- Health: 10%
- Transportation: 8%
- Books: 8%
- Investment: 7%
- Miscellaneous: 2%
- Charity: 1%

Outside of the charity number being so low (that definitely something I need to work on over the next month), the only category that really has much to do with identity at all is the books (I like identify as a proud member of the liberal intelligentsia haha). The local microbrews and folk-rock concerts can probably be added in as well as having to do with identity (I'm a bit of a hippie), as can the charity (I'm an overly cheap Christian) but that really only makes up one quarter of my spending for the month.

On another level, social media is also beginning to subvert the original purpose of brands to begin with. As we discussed in class, brands only became important when folks began buying commodities from a third-party, rather than directly from a local producer whose reputation the purchaser would have known about. With the advent of modern capitalism, brands were necessary to signal reputation of the producer, since the original producer may have been half a world away from the purchaser. Now however, with social media, anyone can talk about the quality of any sort of product with folks all over the world. Thus, while brands are still important (I'm typing on my MacBook Air right now), the consuming public increasingly has the power to discuss and define a brand, subverting the producer's ability to define their brand to a certain extent.

Two more quick points I'm only starting to think about. I'm in the midst of reading Karl Marx's Capital, and I've started to further nail down the whole identity creation through social media thing. In Marx's read on a capitalist society, the problem with the capitalist class is that they privately own the means of production, and thus can extract surplus value from the laborer, which turn leads to an increasing concentration of capital... did I get it right? If we take as a given that creation identity is a central factor in capitalist consumption, then capitalism is at very least on the verge of changing its form. This is because an increasing percentage of individuals (one third of people globally currently have internet access and another third have mobile phone access), now control their own means of identity production in the form of blogs, Facebook accounts, YouTube accounts and the like. This idea needs to be fleshed out a great deal still, but I'd like to think I'm on to something.

So, what does Christian discipleship look like in this digital age, where the masses increasingly control their own means of identity production? I haven't fleshed this out yet, but I've been repeatedly drawn to a Gustavo Gutierrez quote from A Theology of Liberation when thinking about this:

Men are called together, as a community and not as separate individuals, to participate in the life of the Trinitarian community, to enter into the circuit of love that unites the persons of the Trinity. This is a love which "builds up human society in history." The fulfillment and the manifestation of the will of the Father occur in a privileged fashion in Christ, who is called therefore the "mystery of God." For the same reason Sacred Scripture, the Church and the liturgical rites were designated by the first Christian generations by the term mystery, and by its Latin translation, sacrament. In the sacrament the salvific plan is fulfilled and revealed; that is, it is made present among men and for men... The sacrament is thus the efficacious revelation of the call to communion with God and to the unity of all mankind (Gutierrez 259).

As Christians in community, as the Church, Christ's body on earth, increasingly both has individual and collective access to our own means of identity production, it becomes increasingly easier for God to work through Christian community as a sacrament to the world.

God's peace,
Dustin

Dustin is currently in his final year of a Masters of Divinity program at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, having recently completed a year as Vicar at the Lutheran Office for World Community and Saint Peter's Church in New York City. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.

What I've Been Up to for the Last Six Months

What follows is a post I wrote for my internal Vicar's Page at Saint Peter's Church where I currently serve as Vicar, but I figured it could work as a general update on my year as well.  Please leave comments and questions!

Well, much like what often happens on these sort of things, the last six months got pretty busy, and I've thus had "Update the Vicar's Page" as an item on my to-do list for almost that long.  My hope is that over the final two months of my internship at Saint Peter's and the Lutheran Office for World Community, (my last Sunday is August 11th) I'll have the opportunity to add to this page a little more frequently.

That said, the last six months, while quite busy, have been filled with absolutely amazing experiences at both internship sites, so I figured I could go through a quick exercise of filling in folks on what I've been up to.  After a great break over Christmas and New Years, I served as chaplain at a retreat at Camp Calumet Lutheran in New Hampshire.  Working with a rowdy group of teenage campers reuniting from the previous summer, we had a bunch of great talks on faith, service and global mission - and had a bunch of fun as well. We "live-tweeted" the entire retreat on Twitter, and for more information you can check out my personal blog here.

After getting back from my time in New England, things we really started to pick up.  A major aspect of my internship at the United Nations is doing communications work for Ecumenical Women, a coalition of church denominations and ecumenical organizations working to advance the rights of girls and women, especially at the annual Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).  As the 57th session of CSW was taking place at the beginning of March, I spent a great deal of time this winter blogging, posting videos and managing online registration for various Ecumenical Women events during CSW.  I believe our work at CSW57 turned out to be a huge success... outside of getting strong agreed conclusions we had more traffic at the EW website than ever before with over four thousand views and many great stories shared during the month of March.  In addition to working with Ecumenical Women this winter, I spent time following the Security Council and Food & Hunger issues at the UN. Perhaps most notably, I've also been working to increase faith-based participation in the World We Want 2015, a web platform where global citizens can give their input for what should follow the Millenium Development Goals in 2015.  If you have no idea what the Millenium Development Goals are, no problem!  Check out an Ecumenical Women post I wrote here giving a basic overview of the whole thing.

While it was sometimes difficult, I tried to balance my work at the UN with my responsibilities and opportunities for ministry at Saint Peter's as well.  Outside of preaching frequently at our Jazz Vespers service, I spent a great deal of time working with our immigration advocacy group this winter, primarily to organize an Immigration Advocacy Workshop, which after being snowed out in early February was held on March 16th.  Roughly twenty-five folks from Saint Peter's, Sion Iglesia Luterana and the local community worshiped together and learned about immigration advocacy on a Saturday afternoon.  For a copy of the bi-lingual liturgy we used for worship, click here.  We also attended New Sanctuary NYC's weekly Jericho Walk for immigration reform a number of times.  I also attended an amazing conference at Union Theological Seminary in February entitled Digital Church: Theology and New Media.  While there I heard a number of clergy and lay leaders discuss how they've used social media to strengthen their ministries.  A number of folks also identified a number of theological issues brought about by the new digital context we find ourselves in.  Another great success was leading an adult forum at Saint Peter's entitled "Ask the Vicar," where folks could ask me questions on my internship experience thus far, my background, etc.

After a brief trip to visit friends at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia where I'm working towards my Master's of Divinity, my focus shifted almost exclusively toward work at Saint Peter's during Holy Week.  I preached during one noontime Mass and assisted with the daily liturgies.  I was also absolutely blown away by how powerful many of the worship services were during Holy Week at Saint Peter's, especially the Easter Vigil.  After Holy Week I traveled to Washington D.C. twice in one week, first for Ecumenical Advocacy Days (a conference that this year focused on food and hunger) and then for a rally for immigration reform with two members of Saint Peter's.  Both experiences were great, especially the many opportunities I had to meet with our elected officials (or at least their staff).

Following my busy week of travel the Lutheran office at the UN hosted a number of seminarians for the Nolde Seminar on Faith and Human Rights, which provided me with a great opportunity to catch up with friends from seminary and learn a great deal as well.  Perhaps one of the most moving days of my internship took place in early May when a number of Saint Peter's members showed up to accompany another member to his hearing for refugee status.  To me, that day couldn't have been a more powerful expression of what "doing Church" is supposed to be like.

Since mid-May things have slowed down a little bit.  I've been preaching more frequently, especially at Jazz Vespers, continuing to work on communications for Ecumenical Women, working on faith-based participation with the World We Want and number of other issues at the UN.  I also attended a powerful anti-hate crime march in response to the killing of Marc Carson in the Village.  For a bit more on my experience you can check out a blog post here.  Another great success was Saint Peter's Parish Council voting in favor of a resolution official endorsing our immigration advocacy group, now called Nuestro Refugio (Our Refuge).  We've also been working on strengthening the partnership between Nuestro Refugio, Sion Iglesia Luterana and New Sanctuary NYC, as well as ensuring there will be leadership in group once my vicarage ends in August.

Well that's about it.  Check back here frequently, and please contact me if you have any questions.

God's peace,

Vicar Dustin

Dustin currently serves as Vicar at the Lutheran Office for World Community and Saint Peter's Church in Manhattan, having recently completed his second year of a Masters of Divinity program at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.

Women Rule the Internet!

Chart from the Pinterest article at TechCrunch linked to in this post.

Just got a petition email in my inbox from Ultraviolet that I thought was definitely worth sharing.  Essentially, it's asking that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg make sure that women are represented on the company's board of directors once it goes public.  If you want to sign onto the petition, you can do so here.  Equally interesting however was the statistics that email brought to bear.  I had no idea that almost across the board, women are far more active online than men.  For instance, 62% of sharing that happens on Facebook is done by women.  More women use Twitter than men.  The most overwhelming statistic however, is that 97% of Pinterest users in America are female.  A majority of e-commerce transactions at sites like Amazon are conducted by women as well.  Check out this article from TechCrunch for more information: "Why Women Rule the Internet."

As a male involved in a lot of online advocacy and formation of worship communities, I found these statistics to be extremely helpful.  When organizing and attending to an online advocacy or faith-community, it seems like making sure I take into account the perspectives and input of females is more important than ever.  Please share your thoughts on the subject in the comments section, and as always, thanks for reading!

God's peace,
Dustin 

Dustin is a Masters of Divinity candidate in his second year of study at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice building in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin really likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.