You may have heard of the phenomenon of “doomscrolling”—the practice of reading excessive amounts of news, particularly on the internet or social media—particularly negative news—reading post after post, or article after article, scrolling through them endlessly on your phone or tablet. The word “doomscrolling” seems to have come into existence during 2020—a year of hard news if ever there was one—and I first heard it, actually, on January 6, 2021. Some psychologists hypothesize that the practice comes out of a need we have to find some sort of control in out-of-control situations—things like a global pandemic or an insurrection at the Capitol. Perhaps not surprisingly, though, psychologists also warn that the overconsumption of negative news hour after hour, day after day, exacerbates mental health issues like anxiety or depression.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve found myself anxiously consuming more news than usual over the past few weeks—for me, it takes the form of podcasts that I can listen to in the car or if I want to stress myself out while I’m cooking dinner—news analysis podcasts that endlessly dissect the smallest nuances of public opinion polls, statements made to the press by our leaders, the countless permutations of what may or may not happen in our nation over the next few months.
There’s a lot of anxiety out there right now. People from across the political spectrum have expressed it. Folks from the political right and the political left have shared with me recently that they don’t recognize the country they’re living in. Tensions are high. The stakes seem even higher.
As Christians—as followers of Jesus Christ—we may be tempted to despair in the present environment, a society that sometimes seems to be moving in directions divergent from the values of love, compassion, forgiveness and reconciliation that Jesus teaches us. We might feel anger when we hear the name of Jesus invoked to motivate fear and division rather than hope and charity. As we follow the news—maybe a little bit too closely—we might find ourselves caught up in the anxiety and fear that’s coursing through our civic life.
But friends, when I hear a text like Psalm 23—a text that’s so familiar to many of us, so close to our hearts—I am reminded that we do not have to submit to anxiety or fear. “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil—for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.”
I shall fear no evil.
The psalm reminds us that we are cared for—not in the way that political parties or elected leaders promise to improve things for our benefit—but that we are truly and deeply cared for, well and truly held, by God—the God who made us and whose kingdom draws near to us in Jesus Christ. As seekers of God, as the people of God, we follow a shepherd who offers us true abundance, the true nourishment of our souls, even in unquiet times—a shepherd who, the psalmist says, “spreads a table before us in the presence of those who trouble us.”
We follow a shepherd who not only leads us but joins us—even in the valley of the shadow of death I shall fear no evil, for thou art with me. God joins us in human history as Jesus of Nazareth—Jesus’s own time and place being full of political turmoil and turbulence. God joins us in the Holy Spirit, moving and breathing in the Church week after week, year after year, century after century, “guiding us along right pathways for his Name’s sake.” God joins us in this place, in our gathered community, as we come together in our rounds of prayer and thanksgiving, making us the body of Christ called to love one another and to go out proclaiming God’s love for the world.
A friend of mine asked me the other day what we’re supposed to do—how are we supposed to move forward when everything seems to topsy-turvy all around us.
Friends, whatever your politics, and whatever directions our society moves in, our vocation as Christians is clear—love God, and love your neighbor as yourself. We may or may not be able to move the needle on national affairs, but we can—we must—continue to follow our true shepherd, to follow Christ, in own lives, in our own homes and communities. We can—we must—be kind to one another and compassionate to those we meet. We can—we must—be agents of forgiveness and reconciliation—in our families, in our workplaces, in our social groups.
St Paul writes in his letter to the Romans that nothing will separate us from the love of Christ—“neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor power, nor heigh, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” This is good news, friends—in the love of God, we have nothing to fear—our shepherd will let nothing in all creation separate us from God. God will be with us even—and especially—when the world seems darkest. Surely God’s goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our life, and we will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.