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ยท The Internet brings many benefits, but also dangers: the fragmentation of community; social isolation; faith in technology
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It is Lent, and the Archbishop of York, Dr David Hope, is manfully resisting temptation. Alone in his remote but splendid palace of Bishopthorpe he senses that in seconds he could have the world at his fingertips. The awesome potential of the power on offer is so overwhelming it is almost tangible. But it must be resisted. Instead of logging onto his computer and surfing the Internet, Dr Hope elects to leave and visit a community of nuns in Whitby, accompanied by Baroness Judith Wilcox, where he must carry out a quinquennial visitation.
Since his translation from London back to his native Yorkshire in 1995, Dr Hope, a plain-speaking traditionalist, has established himself as the closest thing the Church of England has to a backbone. Primarily interested in pastoral work in his diocese, in particular in education, which leads him to visit dozens of schools each year, he has also, albeit with a faint air of regret, taken his place at the head of the table at interminable meetings of the General Synod, the new Archbishops' Council (which is a kind of Cabinet-style management committee) and at the Church Commissioners.
Currently he carries an air of worry. Boards, committees and synods are necessary for the eternal running of church affairs, but all around him he sees drastic changes to the nature of society, to the environment, that more could be done to address. He throws down a gauntlet that he wants both Church and Government to pick up. This is the challenge of the new technology. And while not opposing change of itself, he sees it as his pastoral duty to urge deeper reflection on the long-term ethical implications of, primarily, the Internet.
Community
"There is a good deal in our society today to do with the pursuit of the self and self interest," he says. "Certainly freedom is a good and positive thing for the individual but equally there is a pursuit of individual rights which can go too far. I believe that the way God has actually created us as human beings and, as a society, is that we should have a proper and reasonable responsibility towards each other. I think we are in grave danger of losing that in Britain."
He pauses to reflect. "I think of local communities. Many people have written on this subject. This is also something which is wholly in accord with the Gospel. If we lose that sense of 'love thy neighbour', that sense of concern for our neighbour, what the Chief Rabbi describes as the 'civic virtues', then we shall, as a society, be the poorer."
The Internet
In some respects, the churches, particularly the evangelical and liberal elements, have been among the fastest of all sectors of society to realise the potential of the Internet. But there are a considerable number of senior church figures who have deep-seated doubts about its long-term effects. Dr Hope was one of the last Bishops to succumb to the Web, although a handful of others are still resisting its lure. Bishopthorpe, where he lives, has recently gone on the Internet (see link below).
"I am concerned particularly about the introduction of modern electronic technology which is moving at such a pace," he says. "I fear that we are becoming a nation which simply sits in front of a television screen and orders its lives at the press of a button or a mouse. You can live your whole life and do almost everything from there - shopping, film viewing - if you choose. That has serious implications for social intercourse and social interactions. It merely underlies the individualism and individuality which in one sense is right but has to be properly balanced with the way we interact with each other for the health of the nation."
"I think it will mean a further fragmentation and break-up of our society if we are not vigilant about this matter. Furthermore we need to have some regard for the underlying bedrock of spiritual values and the spiritual dimension of who and what we are as persons. That is in danger of being lost in our technologically driven age. I recognise it in myself. No sooner do you get into the Internet than you look up one subject, become fascinated and are drawn to look up more and more.
He does not go quite as far as the Rev Jim Peasboro, an America pastor who has written a book, 'The Devil in the Machine, in which he argues that modern computers have enough thinking capacity to be possessed by demons and who argues that one in ten computers in America could now be home to an evil spirit. But his colleague down South, the Archbishop of Canterbury, has also recently warned of the isolation that can be engendered by computers, and warned of his nightmare vision of a world of disconnected souls staring blankly at flickering computer screens.
Dr Hope says: "The danger is that we could be moving towards a soulless society. The technology consumes us, it actually begins to ensnare us. That is not to say it is a bad thing in itself. I go around schools in the diocese a lot and I see children on the Internet, looking at CDroms for information. All that is extremely positive and valuable. But we do need to be aware of the other side. This could mean a society which is even more materialistic, which puts its faith and trust in a technology which is itself vulnerable. It could have serious implications for our social intercourse, for all societal bondings, for the way we are as human persons and the way we develop, because we develop through our interactions with other people."
He accepts it is here to stay, uses it himself and enjoys it. He has no desire to turn the clock back. But he wants Government to take his concerns seriously, concerns which are gaining ground throughout all religious communities.
Community access to the new technology
"The new technology is the new thing for the new age and we have got to find ways to enable those at the bottom of the pile to use it as well. Recently I opened a new community centre with an IT dimension and met an 80-year-old woman who was taking to it in a big way. That increased my confidence, because it was in a poor area where unemployment and crime were high. It was also interesting to see younger children helping the old, and the old helping the young. If the technology can be used by people coming together, that is good. The danger is in having all this wizadry in individual homes which people never leave and where there is, as a result, no social interaction."
"Like all these developments, and the Internet is no different, there is that which has the potential for good, and that which has the potential for evil. There is in the Internet the potential for destroying ourselves. What can be done? Here the churches can play a part, certainly in terms of providing communities, getting people together and being a meeting place for people to network. The faith communities generally tend to gather people together, people of disparate interests."
"And to the extent that schools are addressing these issues with children, I do have hope. I do want to emphasise the positive aspects. But there are certain cautions which have to be registered. I do think there are dangers, that this technology is something that could ultimately devour us."
Dot.com shares and demutualisation
He has similar concerns about the dot.com revolution on the finance markets. "There are ethical and moral dimensions of the market which we should not neglect. Clearly the making of money at the expense of others is not a very Christian virtue. It raises big questions about morality in the market place. The market, left to itself, does have real dangers. There is no automatic benefit in simply leaving market forces to themselves. A lot of people have had their fingers burnt, and some people have made huge amounts of money, while others have made huge losses."
He has no intentions of becoming an Internet stakeholder. "I gather it is a rather precarious sort of exercise. I do not understand all the complexities of it but people tell me that investing in older, established companies is wiser. There may not be the huge profits to be made immediately, but in the long term it would seem a more propitious way of proceeding." Yorkshire through and through, he is cautious about his own investments: "I don't play the market myself. I do have a building society account and I try to get the best rates of interest."
He is with the Bradford and Bingley, which is planning to float on the Stock Exchange later this year. This arouses another concern of his: the spate of demutualisations. He is a strong opponent. "I regret very much this carpet bagging which is going on. The mutuals do have considerable benefits. They are much more solid. I am just an ordinary saver with a very modest amount so my views do not count very much, but it all seems to me very opportunistic. It may have short-term benefits, but I am old-fashioned enough to believe there is considerable benefit to be had in the old mutuals."
Transport and the environment
Further concerns centre on the environment and transport. More than 1,000 pylons are to be erected in the biggest expansion of Britain's electricity grid for 20 years, with proposals to put up more than 400 pylons through the Vale of York and Ayrshire in Scotland already granted approval. Dr Hope has joined the opposition in towns and villages in the affected areas. "I am involved in a complaint against a proposal to site a string of pylons along the A19 in North Yorkshire. These pylons will greatly disfigure a very beautiful part of the country and this proposal needs to be resisted. The Secretary of State has decreed it is going to happen and I very much regret that," he says.
He is also in a mood to tick off the Government on its transport record. "John Prescott has one of the worst and most difficult problems to tackle but I think we do need to have a much more integrated system of public transport. Some northern towns, such as Manchester and Sheffield, have begun to bring back the tram. And in York itself, we need to be more serious about pedestrianisation. As for the London Underground, well that is just grim." A frequent Underground traveller, he uses it to cross London from Kings Cross to Victoria to attend sessions at the House of Lords or meetings at Church House, the headquarters of the Church of England, the Church Commissioners in Westminster or at Lambeth Palace, where the Archbishops' Council meets monthly.
"If there were to be a serious incident underground, I just wonder sometimes how people would escape," he says. He says he is never recognised on his travels, and this gives him the anonymity to experience the full horror of the suffering occasioned by the Underground. "The last time I went, I thought I was going to be suffocated. At Oxford Street the whole train disgorged itself and I had no choice but to be disgorged with it, even though I was going on to Victoria. I shook my coat out and got back on the train but these kinds of things can be terrifying experiences. Similarly, I had to go to hospital recently. I always use the NHS but I am very concerned. The people there do a sterling job and are courteous. But I was very aware of the pressures they are under, the large numbers of people to be seen, the emergencies that would suddenly come in and disrupt the flow."
Like Pope John Paul II, he has just been to Israel, leading a diocesan pilgrimage, although he flew out as the Pope flew in. While there, when he noted the lowering levels of the Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee, he thought more on environmental issues. He returned to find his garden at Bishopthorpe in full flower with blossoms appearing weeks ahead of schedule. "I hesitate to mention global warming but look at the terrific storm damage around the world, the disproportionate floods and rainfall. These are the proper concerns of the Church, that we use the gifts God has given us wisely and that stewardship is not just to grab everything there is, but to ensure that our use of our environment is sustainable. Maybe we have to start exercising some restraint. We can't go on expecting to get more and more. Resources are finite. I would want to urge the Government to be clearer about environmental concerns."
The Sabbath
But he was also impressed in Israel by the Jewish Sabbath. "We were there over two Fridays, for Shabbat. It impressed me how, as dusk fell on Friday night, there was a breathing out, a respite, as whole towns and cities slowed down to rest at the end of another week. When we awoke on Saturday there was no traffic. Everything was quiet, silent, until evening fell again. We have lost that in Britain." Maybe that's the answer - a day when everyone in Britain must engage in conversation with each other instead of logging on or travelling on the Underground. Now there's something to hope for. Sadly, it doesn't look as though he has a prayer.
Related links
The Archbishop of York
The Ruth Gledhill Interview: John Major
The Ruth Gledhill Interview: Marvin Olasky
The Ruth Gledhill Interview: Ann Widdecombe
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