Reading the Times: A Literary and Theological Inquiry into the News
Overview
“Reading the morning newspaper is the realist’s morning prayer.”—G. W. F. Hegel
Whenever we reach for our phones or scan a newspaper to get “caught up,” we are being not merely informed but also formed. News consumption can shape our sense of belonging, how we judge the value of our lives, and even how our brains function. Christians mustn’t let the news replace prayer as Hegel envisioned, but neither should we simply discard the daily feed. We need a better understanding of what the news is for and how to read it well.
Jeffrey Bilbro invites readers to take a step back and gain some theological and historical perspective on the nature and very purpose of news. In Reading the Times he reflects on how we pay attention, how we discern the nature of time and history, and how we form communities through what we read and discuss. Drawing on writers from Thoreau and Dante to Merton and Berry, along with activist-journalists such as Frederick Douglass and Dorothy Day, Bilbro offers an alternative vision of the rhythms of life, one in which we understand our times in light of what is timeless. Throughout, he suggests practices to counteract common maladies tied to media consumption in order cultivate healthier ways of reading and being.
When the news sets itself up as the light of the world, it usurps the role of the living Word. But when it helps us attend together to the work of Christ—down through history and within our daily contexts—it can play a vital part in enabling us to love our neighbors. Reading the Times is a refreshing and humane call to put the news in its place.
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- Invites readers to take a step back and gain some theological and historical perspective on the nature and very purpose of news
- Provides a refreshing and humane call to put the news in its place
- Reflects on how we pay attention, how we discern the nature of time and history, and how we form communities through what we read and discuss
- Introduction: Reading the News in Order to Love Our Neighbors
Part 1: Attention
- Macadamized Mind
- The Blessed Man as a Rooted Tree
- Liturgies of Attention
Part 2: Time
- Kairos Versus Khronos
- Figural Imagination
- Liturgies of Christian Time
Part 3: Community
- Belonging in the Public Sphere
- Belonging Outside the Public Sphere
- Liturgies of Christian Belonging
Top Highlights
“‘The average person of our time loses the ability to see because there is too much to see!’” (Page 11)
“Framing the importance of the news in terms of democracy may not offer sufficient guidance, although it’s a fine place to start. But, as Christians, we should seek to attend to contemporary affairs as citizens of heaven who have been called to love our neighbors here and now. What do we need to know to love our neighbors well? Or, to frame the question differently, to what do we need to attend in order to live faithfully in this place and in this time? These are the questions the gospel calls us to answer, and they are much more compelling and difficult questions than asking simply what we need to know to be informed voters.” (Page 6)
“If we have a better understanding of what the news is for—and what it’s not for—we will be better able to produce wise reports and analyses of contemporary events and to respond to these charitably. When the news sets itself up as the light of the world, it is usurping the role that rightly belongs only to the Word proclaimed in the gospel. But when the news helps us attend together to the ongoing work of this Word, it plays a vital role in enabling us to love our neighbors.” (Page 7)
“To what should we attend? How should we imagine and experience time? How should we belong to one another?” (Page 6)
“Thoreau warns that the increased abundance and speed of the news threaten to fragment our attention and damage our ability to see what is really happening and to think rightly about these events.” (Page 11)
- Title: Reading the Times: A Literary and Theological Inquiry into the News
- Author: Jeffrey Lyle Bilbro
- Publisher: IVP Academic
- Print Publication Date: 2021
- Logos Release Date: 2021
- Pages: 187
- Era: era:contemporary
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
- Subjects: Mass media › Religious aspects--Christianity; Religion and the press › United States; Journalism › Objectivity--United States; Newspaper reading › United States
- ISBNs: 9780830841868, 9780830841851, 0830841865, 0830841857
- Resource ID: LLS:READINGTHETIMES
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-30T02:38:21Z