Recovering Humanity

We exist in a culture that has rapidly changed and the church has desired for the youth pastor to keep up with it. We are the ones who have practiced cultural exegesis and have been looked at to provide helpful answers. In this current moment, it is important to consider: have we been asking the right questions? 

The Question We Should Be Asking

This past month, I met with a group of youth pastors from our metro area. We gathered for a meeting on teenage pregnancy and how to pastor our youth through it. I was convinced and convicted that so much of what we can do as pastors and youth pastors begins well before our teenagers even think about having sex. 

The current truth about premarital sex is that it’s not the primary issue. Consider the fact that according to the Center for Disease Control, teenagers are dating and having less sex now than at any point in the past 70 years. The birth rate for teenagers reached a high of 96.3 births per 1,000 teens in 1957; the birth rate has bottomed out at 13.1 births per 1,000 teens in 2023. Teenagers are putting off dating, marriage, and sex more so than their predecessors. Sex is not the root problem. What I saw and so many others have seen is the source of our issue: we have forgotten who we are as humans.

What I saw and so many others have seen is the source of our issue: we have forgotten who we are as humans. Share on X       

One person who has helped us better understand what the Scriptures say about our identity was Pope John Paul II. His life’s work, Theology of the Body, speaks and clearly responds to the question: “Who are you?” These are the opening words to the Theology of the Body curriculum called “You. Life, Love, and the Theology of the Body.” Our youth no longer know how to answer that question. 

Let’s get really basic for a moment in answering “who are you?” You are human; you are male or female, a boy or a girl, a man or a woman. You have parents, a dad and a mom. You have a name. You were once a baby and you have lived perhaps a few decades. As a human, in general you have five senses: taste, touch, sight, smell, and hearing.

As Christians, we believe that as a human, you were made in the image of God, and so you have inherent meaning. This is due to the fact that you were made by our God, who is love, and He created you out of His love. This is you; this is a part of who you are.

The Real Threat to Our Identity

However, many are rightly arguing that we have lost the understanding of who we are as humans, not because of sexual promiscuity, but through the rapid advance of the technological revolution. This has become especially evident with the increasing awareness of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Recently, I listened to a talk given by Aaron Kheriaty, a Medical Doctor, who spoke on transhumanism. Transhumanism is the belief or theory that humans can evolve beyond what we are now through science and technology. Kheriaty states: “It’s been a transhumanist dream from the dawn of modern computing that someday we will be able to upload the informational content of our brains, or our minds (if you believe in minds), into some sort of massive computing system, or digital cloud, or other technological repository capable of storing massive amounts of data. On this materialist view of man, we will then have no more need for our human body, which, after all, always fails us in the end. Shedding this mortal coil—this organic dust that always returns to dust—we will find the technological means to…well, to live forever. Living forever in the digital cloud or the mainframe computer in the sky constitutes the transhumanists’ eschatology: salvation by digital technology.”

Now this may sound like some sort of bad science fiction movie, but transhumanism has gained strong enough footing that it is spoken about at the highest levels of government, including the World Economic Forum. There, a talk entitled “Will the Future Be Human?”, was given in 2018 in between talks from the German Chancellor and the current French President. Why would a society that believes we can live for eternity in a digital cloud be concerned with sex, marriage, and having children? It is much easier to face the digital device in front of us than a real person who may hurt us or reject us. The more we interact with the digital world, and the more our children interact with that same world, the closer we are to transhumanism than to humanity.

The more we interact with the digital world, and the more our children interact with that same world, the closer we are to transhumanism than to humanity. Share on X

What do I mean by that?

Our phones, computers, video games, and AI have been slowly, and in some ways quickly, eroding our humanity. We would rather be distracted than suffer. We would rather be safe than challenged. Consider the fact that a recent study found that 33% of teens who use AI companions “Find their time with the technology to be more satisfying than time with real-life friends”. If we do not know how to see ourselves as meaningful without input from technology, how can we even begin to see each other rightly? 

Finding Humanity Again

We need a new frame of reference, a new way to see the world, a way to truly see how Christ sees us. Consider these two teachings on a similar topic of how to look at an attractive person. 

First, consider this idea from the purity movement of the 1990’s and early 2000’s. I still remember the “bouncing eye”, which taught “she caught your eye, now bounce your eye away.” Every Young Man’s Battle mentioned this in the chapter, “Developing your Battle Plan.” It argues, “In the past, your eyes have always bounced toward the sexual and not away from it. To combat years and years of this reflexive action you need to train your eyes to immediately bounce away when it comes upon a sexy image…when your eyes bounce toward a woman’s attributes, they must bounce away immediately.”

Now consider this quote comes from You. Parent’s Guide: “In the early Christian Church, several bishops were gathered outside a cathedral in Antioch, when a beautiful prostitute passed by on the street. Upon noticing her, the crowd of bishops looked away to avoid being seduced. Bishop Nonnus, however, stared intently at her and then said to his fellow bishops, ‘Did not the wonderful beauty of that woman delight you?’ The bishops remained silent. Nonnus insisted, “Indeed it delighted me.’ But he wept for her. When the prostitute saw how the bishop looked at her, she was caught off guard. No man had ever looked at her with such purity. He was not lusting after her, but rather saw something in her that she did not even see in herself. The simple purity of that one bishop’s glance marked the beginning of her conversion to Christ. She soon returned to seek his spiritual guidance, and today, we know this former prostitute as St. Pelagia.”

Do you see the difference between the two?

What Every Young Man’s Battle taught young men was that women were dangerous and looking at them can draw them into sin. You may think that this book no longer has any relevance, but just this past year, one of my youth told me that he and a group of friends were going through it together. 

Bishop Nonnus knew who he was in Christ and because of that he saw with the eyes of Christ. Let us be like Bishop Nonnus and teach our children to see one another as Christ sees us: as ones made in the very image of God and if in Christ, sons and daughters of our Most High God. We need to be reminded of this over and over again and then take it out into the world. If we know who we are in Christ, we can better see others for who they are. Let us put down the screens and engage with the people around us; people who reflect the very glory of God. 

The question was “who are you?” The answer is you are made in the very image of God, you and all of those around you.

Photo Credit: Bita Eskandari