Vicar’s Views - March 2010

The 'Nostalgia' column in the Courier last week remembered the day on which the Tunbridge Wells telephone switchboard went automatic in 1965. The operators' final task was to call each customer to explain the changeover to direct dialling. Just after the time of that transition, when I was a child, an elderly neighbour fell badly and broke her leg. She managed to drag herself to the telephone and summon help by dialling the only number she could remember, which was ours, the simple '1234'. In seconds we were able to use the spare key we held to get into her home and assist her.

Less than a hundred years earlier the company Western Union had declined the offer to buy the patent for the telephone from its inventor, Alexander Graham Bell, saying that 'it has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication'. Less than 50 years after the neighbour called us for help there are so many telephones that we now need to memorise eleven digits rather than just four. There are around 1.5 billion landlines in the world, but that number is dwarfed by over 4 billion mobile phone subscriptions that have sprung up in the last 20 years.

We live in the 'communication age' of the mobile phone and the internet. In the last couple of weeks I have been exploring some of the new ways of getting in touch with people. Around 20 internet-savvy church members have joined 'Twitter' as part of our Lent Bible Reading programme - each posting brief comments and reflections on the Bible passage of the day. Reading the Bible 'in community' is a great encouragement and inspiration (which is why small groups in church are so important). Also, following a promise I made in Vicars Views many months ago, I have started to get in touch with long-lost family members. Today's way of doing that is by using the 'Facebook' site on the internet. Within 48 hours of sending out digital feelers across the world wide web a second cousin, and a cousin once removed - in fact very removed, in South Africa - had made contact and joined me in a 3-way conversation.

Facebook communication will never compare with the joy of meeting and talking face-to-face, but whether we love or hate technology, few would wish to live without being able to talk with friends and family over long distances via the phone. The Bible's wisdom-writer noted that 'there is nothing new under the sun'. We may think we have 'invented' ways of speaking to someone who is not 'physically' with us in the room, but God created us from the very beginning to live in a true 'communication age' with Him, through prayer. Rather than memorising dialling codes, Christians have simply to remember Jesus words. 'This then is how you pray - Our Father...'

Stephen Hills