Thursday, March 6, 2014

Well Said: The Church, the Media, and the "Prince of this World"

He [Marshall McLuhan] frequently turned his attention to examining the relation between the Church and media:
It is not brains or intelligence that is needed to cope with the problems with Plato and Aristotle and all of their successors to the present have failed to confront. What is needed is a readiness to undervalue the world altogether. This is only possible for a Christian... All technologies and all cultures, ancient and modern, are part of our immediate expanse. There is hope in this diversity since it creates vast new possibilities of detachment and amusement at human gullibility and self-deception. There is no harm in reminding ourselves from time to time that the "Prince of this World" is a great P.R. man, a great salesman of new hardware and software, a great electric engineer, and a great master of the media. It is his master stroke to be not only environmental but invisible for the environmental is invincibly persuasive when ignored.
The Medium and the Light: Reflections on Religion by Marshall McLuhan
True. Not something I expected to hear from Marshall McLuhan. Which is one of the joys of reading this book.

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