









































182  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

Left to Our Devices
Playing with Spiritually Formative  
Media Discernment
Chris Rosser, Theological Librarian, Oklahoma Christian University

ABSTRACT Consumption of mis- and disinformation and “alternative real-
ity” have profoundly shaped “Christian” identity for many. In this info eco-
system, skills for media literacy (or better, media discernment) are a crucial 
spiritual discipline for spiritual formation; media literacy as a discipline 
emerges in response to a new technological reality where spirituality and 
community are mediated by screens. This session challenges participants 
to play with media discernment as crucial for spiritual formation. Among 
players who live, move, and have our being in a media-rich, info-saturated 
system, media discernment refers to a disposition of heart and requisite skills 
for critically attending to self and to other in love so that info consumption 
nourishes wellbeing. (NOTE: For a richer experience, online content—includ-
ing slides and gamecard—is available at https://bit.ly/LeftToOurDevices.)

MOVE 1: INTRODUCING KRINO

For the past several years, I’ve enjoyed the opportunity to present at 
Atla on gamified strategies for delivering information and media lit-
eracy instruction. Gameful design has become my passion, not least 
because I’ve experienced its transformational effect on how students 
engage content and how they inhabit communities of learning, espe-
cially online. Indeed, whether visceral or virtual, whether conference 
participants or Proceedings readers, we are a merry band of travelers 
bound together as a community of learners—and what is our aim? 
What do we hope to gain from this dungeon-crawl presentation?

Let me begin by sharing the point and purpose. Consumption of 
mis- and disinformation and “alternative reality” have profoundly 
shaped “Christian” identity for many. In this info ecosystem, skills 
for media literacy (or better, media discernment) are a crucial spiri-
tual discipline for spiritual formation; media literacy as a discipline 
emerges in response to a new technological reality where spiritu-

https://bit.ly/LeftToOurDevices


LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  183

ality and community are mediated by screens. Here, my aim is to 
challenge readers or participants to play with media discernment as 
crucial for spiritual formation. Among players who live, move, and 
have our being in a media-rich, info-saturated system, media discern-
ment refers to a disposition of heart and requisite skills for critically 
attending to self and to other in love so that info consumption nour-
ishes well-being. We wonder: Is it possible that our use of media—or, 
perhaps, our use of these devices that mediate for us a knowing of 
good and evil and a tethering of self and other—is it possible that our 
use of media might initiate within us growth and maturity?

Our path through this discussion is inductive; I am attempting 
to demonstrate possibilities for playing a game with students that 
helps them connect the dots between faith and ethics and informa-
tion consumption. Together, we enter an information dojo. Heroes, 
imagine yourselves as a traveler, a sword-wielding traveler; you 
carry a katana, a sword for slicing, and your sword’s name is Krino. 
Yes, you carry a sword and your sword is named Krino—you are a 
hero-traveler with a sword named Krino embarking on a spiraling 
journey through an information dojo. Our game is played at the in-
tersection of media, faith, and culture, but rather than just thinking 
about media literacy or media ethics or the effects of information 
creation and consumption, we’re paying attention to who and what 
humans are and how and why humans behave the ways they do in 
relation to information. You see, humans are desiring beings—we 
live and learn by our gut as much as our head. So, our session must 
pay attention to media-immersed humanity not just as info consum-
ers but as neighbors to learn to love.

Have you ever considered that the information we encounter is 
a reflection of the mind of another person? Tweets, Tik-Toks, posts, 
books, films, advertisements, graffiti scrawled on the side of a build-
ing, secret notes handed person-to-person—all of this content is 
sourced in the mind of others. And so, in relation to all these neigh-
bors we encounter every day—in person, virtually, or mediated by 
information content—you are in a dialectical relation to others, 
tethered by the information you consume. In other words, our in-
formation-saturated system is characterized by a dialectical tension 
between self and other, which makes it a perfect space for training 
in love for neighbor as self. After all, You shall love the neighbor as 
the self; I am the Lord.



184  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

But this realization raises significant questions: If our informa-
tion-saturated system is characterized by a tethering of self and 
other, then how might our creation and consumption of information 
provide a kind of training in love for neighbor as self? How might 
media consumption help make us mature? How might information 
consumption form us toward maturity?

So, you are a traveler-hero; you carry a sword named Krino; the 
term krino signifies the act of discernment—and the aim of our criti-
cal discernment is not to shred to pieces the information we encoun-
ter, but rather to expose the faces behind so that we might encounter 
an other in love, and so that encounter fosters wellbeing in both self 
and other. OK, let’s play a game.

MOVE 2: DUNGEON CRAWL—AIN’T GOT A PRAYER

You stand before a hulking, metal door; a message, stenciled in spray 
paint, reads: Traveler, take care, and you best beware; in this dungeon, 
you ain’t got a prayer. Prayer. You whisper a prayer, hammer on the 
door with booming clanks; the door groans as it swings inward, open. 
You enter the first dungeon.

Perhaps it seems odd to begin our game with prayer—this isn’t 
church or chapel. But I suppose, this isn’t a typical prayer. If I say, let’s 
begin with prayer (an anticipated, banal suggestion), many will know 
to bow your heads in proper, pious posture; but then, you’ll hear a 
voice praying, an unknown, boisterous voice praying an unfamiliar 
prayer in an unfamiliar place—because I will have begun to play a 
video of the so-called QAnon Shaman praying at the Capitol inside 
the Senate chamber, where he leads other rioters in prayer—and it 
will be shocking and disquieting and provocative to hear, making 
some angry, disquieting the spirits of others; and some may wonder: 
How dare our guide lead this band of travelers into such a disruptive 
and disrespectful encounter—I’m out! But I’ve given you warning, so 
now you know what’s about to happen before it happens. Friends, 
let’s begin our game with prayer:

Jesus Christ, we invoke your name! … Thank you, heavenly Father, for this 
opportunity to stand up for our unalienable, God-given rights. Thank you, 
heavenly Father, for being the inspiration needed to these police officers 
to allow us into this building, to allow us to exercise our rights, to allow 
us to send a message to all the tyrants, the communists, and the global-
ists that this is our nation, not theirs; that we will not allow America and 
the American way of the United States of America to go down. Thank you, 



LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  185

divine, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent creator-God for filling 
this chamber with your white light of love, your white light of harmony. 
Thank you for filling this chamber with patriots that love you. [Yes, Lord!] 
And that love Christ. [Yes!] Thank you, divine, omniscient, omnipotent, and 
omnipresent creator-God for blessing each and every one of us here and 
now. [Amen!] Thank you, divine creator-God for surrounding … [us] with di-
vine, omnipresent, white light of love and protection, peace, and harmony. 
Thank you for allowing the United States of America to be reborn. Thank 
you for allowing us to get rid of the communists, the globalists, and the 
traitors within our government. We thank you, and we love you! In Christ’s 
holy name we pray, amen! [And a-women!] [Find prayer here, starting at the 
7:50 mark: https://bit.ly/shamanprayer; “A Reporter’s Footage from Inside 
the Capitol Siege,” The New Yorker, January 17, 2021.]

In early January 2021, a former graduate student asked me to par-
ticipate in a virtual discussion panel he was hosting, attended by 30 
to 50 working missionaries from various Christian denominations, 
all stationed throughout Europe, Canada, and the United States. Our 
topic was to be information and technology issues around emerging 
modes for “doing church” in response to COVID-19. As his research 
librarian and previous instructor, he thought I’d be a good fit for 
the panel conversation, which was scheduled for January 9th, 2021. 
When I accepted the invitation, none of us foresaw what would 
transpire on January 6th, when scenes of violent insurrectionists 
storming the Capitol dominated all media. Unsurprisingly, many ri-
oted in the name of Trump; others, however, rioted for Trump in the 
name of Jesus, a hand on the Bible and a hand on the gun. I joined 
the virtual conference a few days later still in shock from all that had 
happened; my shock increased dramatically when the facilitator 
announced, “Our presenter for the next two hours is Chris Rosser, 
Theological Librarian,” and asked if I had prepared any slides. This 
wasn’t a panel discussion, it was a presentation, and I had to think 
fast. The tragedy of events on January 6 cannot be overstated; but 
they did present a glimmer of inspiration, and I announced a thesis 
for the presentation that attendees vigorously chewed for the next 
two hours: It has become increasingly and unarguably clear that me-
dia literacy is a necessary discipline for spiritual formation. Let’s talk 
about why and what we can do.    

Historically, when the codex replaced the scroll as primary info-
delivery device, particular modes of spirituality—novel means for 
spiritually forming and shaping adherents, like lectio divina, for 
example—emerged in response to new technology, i.e., the book. 
Today, info delivery is once again primarily mediated by the scroll, 

https://bit.ly/shamanprayer


186  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

except that now we scroll glowing screens for illumination. In this 
new information ecosystem, misinformation and disinformation 
are rampant; conspiracy entities like QAnon “crowdsource reality” 
by turning consumers into info mass-producers; and messaging is 
suffused with appeal to salvation: save the children, save the elec-
tion, save the nation, save your power and influence—all are being 
stolen from you. Such messaging instigated events on January 6th, 
when the US Capitol was awash with antisemitic and racist symbols, 
littered by Trump and QAnon paraphernalia, and scarred with the 
indelible marks of Christian nationalism—in other words, consump-
tion of mis- and disinformation and “alternative reality” have pro-
foundly shaped “Christian” identity for many. 

In this info ecosystem, skills for media literacy (or better, media 
discernment) are becoming a crucial spiritual discipline for spiritual 
formation; media literacy as a discipline emerges in response to a 
new technological reality where spirituality and community are me-
diated by screens. Let me restate that last line again, because it is the 
heart of the problem we’ll be engaging: media literacy as a discipline 
emerges in response to a new technological reality where spirituality 
and community are mediated by screens. 

Activity 1
Heroes, as an example of how to gamify this conversation at the 
intersection of identity and media consumption, on the associated 
gamecard (https://bit.ly/LeftToOurDevices), find “Dungeon Crawl—
Ain’t Got a Prayer.” There are four options for response; each op-
tion is associated with one aspect of whole-person learning: heart, 
mind, spirit, body. Roll your die; match your roll to the corresponding 
response; take a moment to reflect and compose a brief response; 
finally, follow the instructions to “level up.” Consider the following 
questions, associated with aspects of whole-person learning: 

1. (Mind)—How does information creation and consumption 
shape religious or spiritual identity? (Yes, these terms are ill 
defined; just go with your gut!)

2. (Body)—Think about how our devices (computer, phone, 
etc.) mediate connection between bodies, a self encounter-
ing an other. Identify some positive and some negative as-
pects or effects of encounter between self and other that is 
mediated virtually.

https://bit.ly/LeftToOurDevices


LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  187

3. (Spirit)—Have you ever experienced (or can you imagine) 
a virtual space that mediates and fosters spiritually forma-
tive community? What’s that look like? What are character-
istics of such a community?

4. (Heart)—What do you think it means that humans learn 
primarily through our guts rather than through our heads?

Hero, be sure to level up on your card; now, let’s keep playing.

MOVE 3: DUNGEON CRAWL—ENCOUNTERING “IT”

Exiting the first dungeon, a deep breath, and a long hallway. At the 
end of the hallway, a mirror, the size of a door. You walk the hall, 
approach the mirror—it’s smudged and grimy, and in its dim reflec-
tion you see yourself: messy, unkempt, bruised a bit (after all, you 
barely escaped the first dungeon); but you do look like a hero; Krino 
glistens; you like what you see.

Above the mirror, there’s some lettering: Now, a more excellent 
path to the end. What? The words are familiar; they sound a bit like 
the Apostle Paul’s musings on love in 1 Corinthians 13: Now, I show 
you a more excellent way. Oh, it’s a favorite passage; you have much 
of it memorized! Love is patient, love is kind; it does not envy, it does 
not boast, it is not proud. But what does that have to do with getting 
past this mirror and out of this hallway and into the next dungeon? 
You realize, at the end of this passage is a dim mirror—an odd meta-
phor indeed: For now we see dimly, as in a mirror; but then, we see 
face to face.

At the end of the passage in 1 Corinthians 13, the Apostle Paul 
tells us that when he was a child he spoke, thought, and reasoned as 
a child; but when he became mature, he put away childish things. 
What’s interesting here is the context in which Paul makes such a 
statement: he is discussing love, the kind of love that characterizes a 
mature disposition. It’s a love that shatters dim mirrors in which we 
only see ourselves so that we might see face-to-face the others we en-
counter. Love always has its object; speaking, thinking, and reason-
ing as a child is like looking into a dim mirror, loving what you see, 
not realizing you behold a reflection of self, the true object of your 
love. But putting away childish things by speaking, thinking, reason-
ing, and loving as a full-grown person is an act of pushing aside the 
mirror so that we might behold the face of another.



188  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

You grab hold of the dim mirror and push, push, push it aside with 
all your might; and it moves, slides away, reveals an unseen doorway, 
a dark opening; and as your eyes adjust, you begin to make it out: a 
shape? No! A face in the darkness! Who—or what—is it?

Hero, take up your sword—take up Krino, now is the moment! 
Enter the dark, let’s continue our journey, knowing that the trials we 
encounter produce in us endurance; and endurance fosters charac-
ter; and character results in hope, and hope because we see our des-
tination, our telos, our end; and so I remind us of the light guiding us 
to the end of our quest: Among players who live, move, and have our 
being in a media-rich, info-saturated system, media discernment refers 
to a disposition of heart and requisite skills for critically attending to 
self and to other in love so that info consumption nourishes wellbe-
ing. We wonder if such an end is even possible, not least because it 
seems counterintuitive that our consumption of media and use of 
information might result in wellbeing. Mostly, our devices are good 
for escaping “the real world” for a bit; or, our devices are a delivery 
device for anxiety-inducing outrage. We eat the fruit of Apple, but is 
it good for us? Can the virtual foster virtue? After all, two-thirds of 
device is vice. We truly wonder: Is it possible that our use of media—
or, perhaps, our use of these devices that mediate for us a knowing 
of good and evil—is it possible that our use of media might initiate 
within us growth and maturity?

Activity 2
Heroes, as a second exemplar activity for gamifying our conversa-
tion about media discernment, let’s do something that might feel 
more like an actual game. Consider the beginning of a video from 
Tik-Tok, then try to predict what happens next. Now, let me offer a 
soft trigger warning: this video is heartwarming, but it’s sourced in 
pain, the pain of the loss of a parent. If you start to watch and it be-
comes too much and you need to put fingers in ears and close your 
eyes or mute your volume, that’s OK. But let’s give it a try. (NOTE: 
The video belongs to Mandy Patinkin and is available at https://bit.ly/
LoveToAlaska; in this game, the first part is clipped at the 2:08 mark, 
and the remainder is played below). In the clip, a young person who 
has lost a parent reaches out to Mandy Patinkin with appreciation, 
since her dad loved his film The Princess Bride. The first part of the 
clip shows Patinkin and his wife as they initially react to hearing this 
Tik-Tok for the first time.

https://bit.ly/LoveToAlaska
https://bit.ly/LoveToAlaska


LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  189

You might know celebrated actor Mandy Patinkin from his role 
in The Princess Bride, or more recently he starred in Homeland. OK, 
so what do you think—can you predict what happens next? Here 
are four choices:

1. While they’re listening, a cat suddenly jumps onto the coun-
tertop, startles Patinkin, who drops his phone, which thuds 
on the tile floor with an audible crack, and without missing 
a beat Patinkin looks directly at the camera and says, “My 
name is Inigo Montoya, you broke my iPhone, prepare to die!”

2. She finishes her story, and Patinkin, through tears, says, 
“Life isn’t fair, it’s just fairer than death, that’s all” (which is 
also a line from The Princess Bride).

3. She finishes her story, and Patinkin responds by explain-
ing that rumors like that on the internet should always be 
researched a bit more carefully, since skillful Googlers can 
easily pull up the transcript of an interview he did with 
Vanity Fair, in which he describes his motivation in the 
scene as Sigourney Weaver’s character in Alien, who says 
to the monster, Get away from her, you […] (and then there’s 
even more censored, explicative language brought into our 
sacred Atla space, all apologies).

4. Patinkin asks her to find a way to share her father’s name 
with him so that he can pray for him and for her, since he 
prays for everyone he knows, and now he knows her.

You guessed it—the cat knocked over the phone! Not really. Let’s 
watch the rest of the clip. (NOTE: The video linked above can be 
played now from the 2:08 mark.) Indeed, Patinkin does ask the wom-
an to find a way to share her father’s name with him so that he can 
pray for him and for her, since he says he prays for everyone he 
knows, and now he says he knows her. If you guessed correctly, re-
fer to the gamecard and roll the dice to see if you can level up any 
two of the four aspects of whole person learning that you choose. 
Remarkably, this woman’s video was eventually shared with Mandy 
Patinkin because of numerous retweets and tags—a robust matrix 
of info-consumers facilitating connection between self (a grieving 
daughter) and other (her late father’s hero). Though he does not 
know her personally, Patinkin responds with deep sympathy and ac-
tion; he responds to her via his device because he now feels tethered 
to her. Truly fascinating.



190  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

What just happened here? You might be familiar with Martin Bu-
ber’s “I, Thou, It” discussion of how human beings relate to each oth-
er. In a nutshell, Martin Buber, 20th-century Austrian philosopher, 
deploys three pronouns to describe three modes by which humans 
relate to each other. There’s always “I”—me—the self, the point of 
reference. Now, the self “I” might relate to an other as a “Thou,” by 
which Buber means that the self looks full into the face of the other, 
pays attention, is present to, looks the other in the eye, recognizes 
the full stature of the other’s human worth. Or, the self “I” regards 
the other as an “It,” by which the other’s humanity is not seen, not 
valued, but instead the other’s utility, for example, especially to the 
self, becomes the central concern. Likely, you can imagine many ex-
amples of situations in which we make people an “it.”

Martin Buber is not the Austrian version of Justin Bieber. He’s not 
a sexy pop icon at all; he looks just like we might expect his Wiki-
pedia profile to look if we’re Googling “Martin Buber.” But Buber 
is staring at Bieber. As long as all Buber sees is a sexy pop icon, he 
makes Bieber an “it,” an object or thing. But, if Buber looks at Bieber 
as a person, if he stares into his eyes, engages him, is present to him, 
desires to know him and to be known by him, Buber makes Bieber 
a “Thou,” a person.

As noted, the information we encounter is a reflection of the mind 
of another person—and I love Patinkin’s response in this Tik-Tok be-
cause the other, though a stranger, is humanized to the extent that 
he claims to know her, and this knowing produces in him a desire to 
pray for her and her dad. Compassion, empathy—these have been 
mediated by the device, over the platform, via the satellites, through 
eyes and ears and into the heart. Patinkin feels tethered to her, bound 
to her in love. I’m thankin’ Patinkin; he’s high-rankin’, no prankin’. 
“No more rhymes now I mean it!” Anybody want a peanut?

But this example helps bolster our conviction that this tethering 
between self and other that characterizes our information-saturated 
system makes it a perfect space for training in love for neighbor as 
self. You shall love the neighbor as the self; I am the Lord.

And as we think about what it means to be tethered—self to oth-
er—in our info society we recognize that the messages we encoun-
ter originate from and reflect the minds of others who also bear the 
image of God (so say the three major monotheistic religions, along 
with others). This encounter, as mediated by our devices, obligates 
us in love to attend carefully, to pay attention, and as we encounter 



LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  191

difference to humbly make the learner’s confession, I don’t under-
stand, but I’m ready to listen. This attitude is especially necessary and 
especially difficult when we encounter messages we’d rather not 
hear, information that originates from the minds of others who do 
not belong to my particular posse, those situations when it’s easiest 
to gaze upon the other as pixel, as soundbite, as image, as it.

You know, it’s interesting to me: we’ve just thought about Paul’s 
metaphor of the dim mirror in which we see only self reflected: have 
you noticed that our devices are themselves a dim mirror? Have you 
ever used your screen as a mirror? The glassy screen—maybe a lit-
tle cracked, definitely smudged with finger grease, probably carry-
ing some variant of coronavirus—our devices are a dim mirror. My 
own device became a bit dimmer the other day—I dropped it on the 
pavement and now the protective screen is chipped and cracked. 
The reflection is worse now, but we do it regardless, use our screen 
as a mirror—smudged and dull, not at all a perfect instrument for 
reflecting, but we see what we need—our devices are a dim mirror.

Activity 3
Now, we are about to enter our final dungeon. As a final example of 
gamifying this conversation, refer to your gamecard to begin work-
ing on the next activity, mapping possible learning outcomes to each 
aspect of whole-person learning. Consider the outcomes listed, or 
create some of your own, and try to map various outcomes to mind, 
heart, body, or spirit. Descriptions of what each of those aspects en-
tails are provided. Be sure to follow the instructions for leveling up! 
Let’s play.

MOVE 4: DUNGEON CRAWL—IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL

The face in the darkness you now discern seems to resemble Master 
Shifu from Kung Fu Panda, an odd turn indeed. Shifu summons you 
toward a light beyond the darkness; you proceed cautiously, but you 
are unafraid, mostly because Shifu is so cute. The light beyond the 
darkness diffuses through a papered door which Shifu slides open 
to reveal a small, unfurnished room. A subtle yet pervasive smell of 
reed-mat flooring—tatami—comforts you, and you enter the room: 
this time, not a dungeon but a dojo, a space for training. Scrolls line 
the walls, scrolls that bear messages to learn, messages to remember, 
messages for transformation. The self-other construct is the substruc-



192  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

ture of the cosmos, one scroll reads; while another says, Learning and 
love share a heart; each requires encounter with that which is not self, 
with one who is other; and another scroll presents, Time flies like an 
arrow; fruit flies like bananas, which is just silly. You are ready to be 
trained in this dojo.

Shifu unrolls a scroll—it’s the Genesis scroll!—and Shifu begins to 
speak: we now journey back to the garden of early Genesis. In Gen-
esis 1, we see that Adam (human) is the image and likeness of God 
as two together, male and female, masculine and feminine, that in 
this mutuality we discern image and likeness of the Divine. And we 
discover something similar in Genesis 2, where Adam (in this case, 
a singular and undifferentiated human) is made complete (or, no 
longer alone) when bone is taken from the Adam and used to form 
an other, so that ish (man) is now also with ishah (woman), and then 
ish-ishah reunite to become one flesh. (It’s confusing, but you don’t 
want to interrupt, because you’ve seen the movies and you know 
Master Shifu gets quite annoyed by interruptions.) Shifu continues:

A careful reading of Genesis 2 reveals a different creation story 
from Genesis 1 (for example, creation events are ordered differently), 
and now God is very personal—the imagery is rich and earthy: God 
with hands in the dirt crafting mud animals, breathing life into clay 
so that animals animate and are sent scuttling over to the Adam to 
be named. But the focus of the story is the all-alone-ness of the Adam, 
and this aloneness is not good. So, a companion is fashioned: bone 
of bone, flesh of flesh. And so, the Adam (human) is not one but two 
together, a self and an other. And what we discover as the focus of 
Genesis 2 is companionship—deep loyalty, fusion of identity, shared 
destiny, and (as we ourselves may have experienced as terrible de-
parture), painful loss when death does them part. (Shifu sighs, paus-
es, and proceeds.)

As you see on the scroll before you, we believe that learning and 
love share a heart: each requires encounter with difference, en-
counter with that which is not self. Mature love has learned to love 
neighbor (difference) as self (sameness); likewise, we grow in neither 
learning nor love when we’re only ever surrounding ourselves with 
sameness. It is crucial that we encounter ideas and learning that are 
different from our normed and conditioned expectations—we need 
encounter with ideas that may trigger visceral reaction; because, as 
you’ve heard me say, that gut punch, that visceral reaction, signals a 
gap between self and other; it is the first sensation of krino, of criti-



LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  193

cal thought, and the visceral is a fertile soil for growing love and for 
growing learning. (Ah, the dojo begins to transform itself! And now 
we’re in a garden and surrounded by growing things. Verdure. Fe-
cundity. Eden.) Shifu speaks:

Some traditions—and I say especially Christians in Roman Cath-
olic and Protestant traditions—take for granted that Genesis 3 de-
scribes the fall of humanity, since the narrative essentially depicts 
disobedience as explanation for sin and struggle, a story of initial 
disobedience as reason for expulsion from paradise and the pres-
ence of God. But what if we’ve misunderstood the intent of this story 
because of a category error—what if we’ve misidentified genre?

As you know, genre establishes expectation for what a text is and 
what a text is doing. Assuming that Genesis 3 offers an explanatory 
narrative for humanity’s fall may edit out other important ways by 
which the story creates meaning. Let’s consider features of Genesis 
3 that indicate it can be understood as a wisdom text, more akin to 
the narrative of Job, story that problematizes assumptions about du-
alistic orientations toward God and human being in the world. (At 
this, Shifu casts a glance that says, Stay with me, hero—you’ll make 
connection between Genesis and media discernment soon enough! 
Persevere!) Shifu continues:

First, pay attention to imagery: the Tree of Life is an image of wis-
dom in the Ancient Near East, and we find this symbol of wisdom 
in biblical wisdom texts like Proverbs and in the Apocryphal writ-
ings; as Proverbs 3:18 puts it, Wisdom is a tree of life to those who lay 
hold of her.

Second, attend to language: humanity inhabits a garden; both are 
naked and feel no shame. In 2:25 indeed we learn that the man and 
woman are naked and feel no shame—the term naked here, arom, 
is wordplay with arum, the word used to describe the serpent as 
shrewd. And this word—often translated in Genesis with negative 
connotation as shrewd or crafty—is a word translated elsewhere 
positively as wise or as prudent, or as in Proverbs 14:18, The simple 
are adorned with folly, but the clever are crowned with knowledge.

Third, attend to players and setting: woman, serpent, man, and 
God in a garden. The humans are portrayed as children—naked 
without shame, sustenance and life all provided by the garden and 
by God. As in fairy tale or fable, they do not seem surprised when a 
serpent strikes up a conversation; and throughout the Ancient Near 
East, serpents were imbued with semi-divine qualities, not least 



194  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

longevity, since the serpent is able to shed its skin and seemingly be 
reborn. God plants two trees—a Tree of Life and a Tree of Knowing 
Good and Evil—and if the Tree of Life is indeed a symbol for wisdom, 
then the fruits of both are “good for making one wise,” yet the Tree of 
Knowing is forbidden—it is an illegitimate means to an end. But note 
that the eating only makes the humans aware of their nakedness—
so readers are left to wonder about the substance and content of 
the good and the evil they will come to know. (Shifu begins to twirl!)

Now—float! Float up, up, up, high like a bird, like a god—take in 
the view. See the woman, man, serpent, tree (PG-13 because they’re 
naked, float up high enough that all is obscured)—see them.

(You are astonished at what Shifu is conjuring, truly a master! 
Haze begins at the edges of sight and moves inward; clarity dimin-
ishes, looks like impressionist art; pixelation; blurring and flattening; 
until greens fade into white; and the white buzzes; static, not still but 
electric; buzzes like a bee; the white seems to hum. Shifu vanishes.)

You rub your eyes; you now sit before a glowing screen. What? 
Hey, seriously, I… 

How can I assist you? A familiar female voice speaks with Irish 
accent, since that’s how you configured Siri in your settings. No, I 
said, Hey, seriously, not Hey, Siri...oh, never mind. You click the little 
“x” and Siri becomes dormant, listening to every word, waiting to 
be summoned.

You sit, perched before an altar, an altar of omniscience, where 
something like a divine being awaits in the cloud to receive your 
prayer, your question, your query. We don’t call it praying; we call 
it Googling. What do you want to know? It’s as close as we come to 
omniscience.

Siri speaks unexpectedly: Did Fauci really say, Don’t swallow what 
you see on Facebook, for in the day you swallow it, you shall surely die? 
You shall not surely die. What do you want to know?

Looks good, appetizing. Helpful for becoming a bit more in the 
know.

Yes, a bit more in the know. Reach, swipe, scroll. Knowledge. Cer-
tainly: a knowledge of good, and a knowledge of evil. “Volunteers 
are rushing to help homeless people in the Northwest cope with 
the heat.” Yes, NPR, thanks, that’s good news! “Quake-hit Haiti faces 
fresh threat from Tropical Storm Grace.” Grace? They named a tropi-
cal storm Grace? Bad—multiple layers of bad. “A California Father 
Claims QAnon Conspiracy Led Him to Kill His 2 Children, FBI Says.” 



LISTEN AND LEARN SESSIONS  195

Evil. Evil news. It’s a bad world—it’s a mad world! And I don’t like this 
feeling—so vulnerable, so helpless. The more I dress up my profile, the 
less people really know me; but the more I post and tweet, the more 
they assume they know me, the more exposed I feel until I feel naked. 
Siri, shut down my computer for now, please.

Float up again, friends, traveler-heroes, and see yourself as you 
now are: a self, tethered to so many others by your devices—heroes 
tethered for training, for training in love of neighbor as self.

It’s a steady diet of good and evil, isn’t it—our daily news? Person-
ally, I can only take so much “reality” before I need to escape. And 
where do I go to escape? Almost every evening when I get home, I 
settle into a comfy chair, grab the Roku remote, click open YouTube, 
and watch Stephen Colbert’s opening monologue from the previous 
night. Stephen is there for me; we’re tight! We think the same about 
things; he says just what I need to hear. He makes me laugh. Whew, 
I don’t know if I could have made it the past seven years without The 
Late Show with Stephen Colbert!

And that’s OK; it has to be OK. But, it’s sameness; I surround my-
self with sameness for the sake of comfort. I love Stephen; he com-
forts me; we’re the same, you know? I recognize it more now: my 
desire to be comforted by sameness; I may not have recognized it as 
clearly a few years ago. So, I have to critically monitor my informa-
tion consumption: What am I watching? Why am I watching? What 
am I not watching?

With such questions in mind, it makes me wonder: Is it possible 
that our use of media—or, perhaps, our use of these devices that me-
diate for us a knowing of good and evil—is it possible that our use of 
media might initiate within us growth and maturity? In other words, 
can our media consumption help make us mature? Can media con-
sumption form us toward maturity?

In the garden, consumption leads to recognition of immaturity—
we’re naked, we’re children.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a 
child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see 
in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. 

You shall love the neighbor as the self; I am the Lord.

Through this “game” we’ve been playing, my aim has been to con-
vey the profound implications of our work as information profes-
sionals, teachers, and librarians. Indeed, theological librarians are 



196  ATLA 2022 PROCEEDINGS

uniquely positioned among our communities to foster and develop 
media literacy and discernment skills among the communities we 
serve. Our work to empower information, media, and digital litera-
cies is important; but why? This work is important—perhaps now 
more than ever—because consumption of mis- and disinformation 
and “alternative reality” have profoundly shaped identity for many, 
not least “Christian” identity. In this info ecosystem, skills for media 
literacy (or better, media discernment) are a crucial spiritual disci-
pline for spiritual formation; media literacy as a discipline emerges 
in response to a new technological reality where spirituality and 
community are mediated by screens. So, we must consider: How 
might our orientation to information become a source of truth, good-
ness, and beauty—a virtuous space—in our lives?

Questions drive our thinking as we continue; questioning is a 
path to maturity, a path we recognize as a necessary tethering of 
self and other, self and other tethered by our devices; and what shall 
become of us—self and other—what shall become of us if left to our 
own devices?


