fr. liam's Reflections

Computers have been a great addition to our world, and they have brought about many benefits. The staggering speed at which they can process information and offer that information back in many different ways is a marvel of human ingenuity. It has provided a very useful tool to help us in our working day as well as from a social point of view.

The genius that was employed to construct the first computer triggered a revolution in engineering and many other associated skills, not to mention the miniaturisation of components to make them smaller than ever. It is often mentioned that the modern smart phone has more computing power than the Apollo programme that launched the astronauts to the moon back in the late 6o’s.

The personal computer brought computers into the small business and the home. Now we have tablets and smart phones which enable us, through the internet, to keep in touch with the wider world. The phone is now a ‘must have’ for most people, from primary school children to the senior citizen. Covid-19 brought about a further development especially for the older persons who learned very quickly to make Zoom calls or FaceTime,  participate in online chats, and to join in to Mass online or other services from the local church or a church located in Ireland or further afield.

But what prompted this particular piece of writing is the experience that I have had in recent days with the computer and phone and how things can get ahead of what was intended.

I was preparing a funeral Mass in recent days and I decided to use the text of a funeral I had conducted recently and just change the names to update the text. I used a marvellous button in the editing facility on the Word document and asked it to replace ‘her’ with ‘him’. It identified immediately the words that I had highlighted. I clicked ‘replace all’ and in the space of a second all the words with ‘her’ were changed to ‘him’.

I was pleased that it was so easy. However, on further inspection I discovered that every word that had the letters ‘her’ were changed to ‘him’. This included words like ‘Father’ which became ‘Fathim’ and so on! You get the idea. It took about 15 minutes to correct all the misspelt words that had been replaced.

Also I was texting some people and unlike the younger generation, I type with one finger or thumb to compose my message. Unfortunately, the predictive text facility changed a lot of the words to what it thought the word should be! And, increasingly, my messages recently were ones I had to correct afterwards when I looked at the message that I had sent. As I said to one person to whom I had sent a message and was horrified to see what went out, ‘apologies for the ‘gobbildy-gook’!

So the lesson is, that while we enjoy the convenience of the modern means of communication, there is still no guarantee that what you intend to send out is actually what was sent!

This weekend we mark World Mission Sunday. The theme chosen for this year is “You will be my witnesses” (Acts 1:8). Communicating the Christian message is a life-long task for all Christians. Sometimes the message is lost in the means of communication, and sometimes the means of communication are misused.

It’s all a great challenge even with the modern means of communication at our disposal. The heart of the message is what is important. Jesus calls on us to know God’s love, to share God’s love and to live God’s love.

Fr. Liam