Commentary:
Are you having a virtual-reality Advent?
By Tom Ballard
There was a time when long-distance providers claimed that telephone calls were "the next best thing to being there." Now, there are many ways in which folks are "here," but through sophisticated technology can go "there." The term currently in vogue is "virtual reality."
I remember being introduced to virtual reality years ago. I was attending a Sunday school social in a church member's home. There was a golf match on TV – or so I thought. After a few minutes, I discovered the match was actually being played by someone right there in the den. It seemed real. The images were crisp. Even the commentators were whispering, just like a real golf match. Yet the match was no more than a videogame. Virtual reality.
Now, a Texas entrepreneur has gone a step further. For a fee, he will arrange a computer/rifle setup where a virtual-reality hunter can be in one place and shoot wildlife on the Texas ranch. When the animal comes within the crosshairs of the virtual-reality scope, the hunter can press the delete key (or whatever the command is) on the computer and bring the animal down. It is a mixture between the real and the virtual real. The animal is really dead, but the hunter isn't really on sight. Virtual reality.
Unfortunately, too many of us only play the virtual-reality side of Advent and Christmas. We are "here" and we can go "there," just like a high-tech game that can be turned on and off again. Mary and Joseph never heard of virtual reality. Mary's pregnancy was real. Joseph's obligation to register for the census in Bethlehem was real. Their hurried flight to Egypt was real.
I just wonder how real the Advent story is to us. I wonder how or if we have allowed the nativity to have an impact us. Maybe Christmas and Advent are just exercises in virtual reality for us. After all, we can't really go to the manger. Or can we?
The Rev. Ballard is senior pastor at First Galax United Methodist Church in Wytheville District.
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