[Click here to listen to the sermon.]

Our society swings wildly between two extremes. One extreme is the production and distribution of mass media. The other extreme is deep isolation. These two extremes are mutually reinforcing social realities.

One hundred years ago mass media meant Newspapers. Then came Radio. Then, Movies and TV. Now add IPods and IPhones, PSPs (PlayStation Portable) and portable DVD players and more personal electronics coming out every few months and you have media saturation to a degree never imagined even by Ray Bradbury.

(For our younger, perhaps media-saturated parishioners Ray Bradbury was a writer of science fiction who once imagined a media saturated world where people stopped thinking for themselves. Do kids still read Fahrenheit 451?)

Mass media is reinforced by deep, personal isolation. This represents the other extreme in our society. Instead of relating to other people in ways that help them experience themselves as deeply valued, people’s lives consist of the consumption of media.

An elementary school principal recently described a child addicted to internet computer games. The principal challenged the father to limit the child’s access to the internet. The father came back with the report that when he tried, the child cried out, “If you take away my computer game, you will take away all my friends.”

The principal looked at the father and quietly said, “Don’t you see? Your child has no friends. He needs real friends.”

People today live these extremes: either immersed in media, or lost in loneliness.

Much of today’s media culture focuses on popularity, celebrity and fame as a substitute for spiritual intimacy and real connection between people. So, some come to believe – especially our children -- that “to be somebody” requires that they must show up in the pages of a glossy magazine, or on the front page of the newspaper.

"Online communities” like Face Book, and My Space tend to reinforce this celebrity cult. My Space celebrity grows with the number of “friends” who register on one’s personal webpage. But what does “friend” mean when connection is limited by what can be communicated across a computer screen?

The human cost here is the loss of a sense of personal value. God created us with eternal value. We possess it as children of God. No one can take away a divine birthright.

You possess eternal value, but you only experience your value in relationship with other people. When another person looks into your eyes with appreciation for who you are, you feel valued. When another person expresses gratitude for your friendship, your eternal value comes to the surface of your consciousness. When another person calls out to you for help, or reaches out to you in your time of need – you experience what it means to really matter.

Popularity, celebrity and fame substitutes fantasy for the substantive relationship for which every person longs. It is a poor substitute for the quality of friendship that can never be manufactured in a studio: To look into the face of another human being and to see the face of God.