Digital cameras are becoming basic equipment for photographers working in the print media. They take their photograph wherever they are in the world and send it down a telephone wire and it's immediately in the newsroom where it can be scanned, cropped and made to fit the shape on the page. It is amazing technology. Everything to do with the computer is mind boggling and the people who write the software for these machines are smart people. It is the age of the computer revolution and it has had dramatic results in the newspaper industry. Copy is sent electronically. Hard copy is becoming a diminishing phenomenon.
There was a time when the old adage, "the camera never lies" was true but those days are over. In the world of the computer you can do anything with a photograph. Have you ever noticed the sky is always blue over the house for sale on dull and bleak days in Ireland? The camera can catch an image, it can pick up every detail of the most extraordinary beautiful things. But while the world of technology and the camera is astonishing, the reality it captures is infinitely more amazing, a fact we often forget. How often do you hear people say that something would make a great picture? Is it not far more wise to relish the beauty of the thing itself rather than the shadow or image it portrays. The world around us is amazing and we shouldn't need digital cameras and computer science to make us aware of that. But we take the familiar for granted, an unwise practice. So what do we say when it comes to God? To dismiss Him with a wave of the hand is a nonsense. That doesn't mean that it's easy to accept His existence but the extraordinary beauty of the world, the miracle of all created reality, might well point to a God.
At times He can be tantalisingly close but God can also be "away out there" with no meaning whatsoever for us. In Chapter 6:51-58 of St John's Gospel, Jesus tells his followers that he is the living bread come down from heaven, "whoever eats this bread will live for ever" and further on in the same passage he says, "The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives with eternal life and I will raise him/her up on the last day."
Remarkable language. But that is what Christians believe the Eucharist is about - making present the reality of God in this world and preparing us for life eternal. The world is all the time showing us glimpses of what we believe is the reality for which we are ultimately destined. Some argue that the evidence is flimsy and some dismiss God out of hand but Christians believe in life forever with God. It is a hope, it is a belief and it is an exciting and challenging idea.
A short 100 years ago if anyone had told us the sky would be full of planes or we could talk on a telephone from West Kerry to Parana we would have laughed at them. Who expected we would have the facility to have a picture taken in Baku and have it on our desk in Tralee within seconds. Where will our technology be in another 100 years? But our technology is a mere shadow of the reality about us. We are all the time learning, making new discoveries, and we continue only to scratch the surface. Surely all this technology is a mere indication of the power and the glory of God, the God we are all destined to realise in eternity. M.C.