Crossing the Digital Divide

Filing through the 768 messages that make up my inbox, I realized that I shouldn’t really be complaining, considering that the newly elected pope has opened an e-mail account for pressing theological questions and concerns. Considering the millions of faithful Catholics with inquiries, his influx of e-mails must be of biblical proportions.

The opening of an e-mail address (benedictXVI@vatican.va) signals a renewed desire of the Catholic Church to get in touch with young tech-savvy Christians. The bounds of such an endeavor seem limitless with the wonders of the Internet. Secure confession chat rooms would be just a start. Five “Hail Marys” would be considerably easier with cut-and-paste, but these sorts of wrinkles can be ironed out. The big challenge is going to be giving communion online. Once again, I think that the collective imagination of the Vatican can overcome these kinds of metaphysical or symbolic obstacles.

Not wanting to be outdone, evangelical Christians in this country are also getting onto the electronic bandwidthwagon. A number of software development firms are looking to develop video games for Christian youth. Trying to follow on the success of the Christian music industry and provide a less-Satanic alternative to Doom and Quake, they are seeking to provide good, clean, Christian fun for the correspondingly good, clean, Christian child.

Numerous problems apparently stand in the way. Funding is difficult to come by, especially for a project that doesn’t yet have an established market. The use of violence is hotly contested—considering its un-Christian ideas but its numerous appearances in the Bible—as is the subtlety of the biblical message imbedded.

Something that apparently is not up for debate is the theological relativism embodied in many games on the market at the moment. Playing as the demons, ghouls, or the Devil is not a safe, spiritual experience. In the words of the New York Times, “while you may fight the Devil and lose, you may not fight as the Devil.” With this in mind, would controlling Jesus himself also be taboo, as sacrilegious role-playing? After all, we definitely don’t want to be playing God.

This ideological single-mindedness has much in common with Pope Benedict’s view that there is only one way to salvation, and it is certainly not achieved by cruising the virtual streets of LA as Beelzebub himself. With this I can see a wondrous combination of Christian initiatives, all for the electronic glory of Christ. Even the binary nature of computer programming is analogous to the Church’s Good vs. Evil dichotomy. With Vatican funding and American marketing and development, the Christian video game market would be set to explode. The collaborations could be momentous. I am sure that Mel Gibson would not be averse to selling the rights for a video game version of his film, “The Passion of the Christ.” I do, however, wonder whether one would be able to find software engineers willing, or even able, to program in ancient Aramaic.

The idea of chasing down demons of hell as an angel firing bolts of holy and spiritual righteousness does not appeal to me. This is probably because I have out-grown my childhood love of pixelated demon hunting. However, I am not their target audience; they are going for, in the words of one developer, the “assistant pastor who wants to go home and play a cool game.” In this quest for holy electronic success I wish them luck, as they seek to answer the eternal question: What Would Jesus Play?

Andrew P. Schalkwyk ’08, a Crimson editorial comper, lives in Holworthy Hall.