Blessed Through the Ether

It thrills me that the United Methodist Church is wrestling with these sort of issues.  Take some time to read these articles to get a sense of the debate, before and after, and from mostly objective standpoints (to their journalistic credit). Then you can hear my mostly subjective and biased response... Click the image for the whole article.

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and another take on it with some excellent quotes...

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As we push further and further into the digital age, what does it mean to commune? Can physical distance limit God's consecrating reach? Apparently, for now the Bishops of the church say it can, resolving last month to halt virtual communion efforts:

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Should we really be pushing a resolution that prevents willing Christians from receiving communion because of the medium that enables it? It seems absurd to me that you can say the internet "trivializes" the holy. By proxy, Jesus healed the boy in Capernaum from over 20 miles away (John 4:51). Is it any different to think that God might bless sacraments from over 20 miles away by internet proxy? Did the distance between Capernaum and Cana "trivialize" the healing? What's the difference between the space between my hand and yours, and the space between my computer and yours?

There is much validity to the fact that the human touch and intimacy is changed if not removed, but that is a condition to be aware of a treated judiciously, not taken as a reason to shut down the whole enterprise. Do we stop praying for someone because they're not there to hear us do it and benefit from the support of our presence? No, we pray. And then we go visit them if we can.