RE-MEMBERING CHRIST-AS-COMMUNITY: A BONHOEFFERIAN ANALYSIS OF CHURCH IN A DIGITAL AGE

The multisite, multimedia megachurch illuminates the problematic of the relationship between sociality and solitude – its digital offerings enable a worship experience that is remarkably connected and yet remarkably isolated. This beckons an interrogation of the what and where of the church community, which beckons remembrance of an imprisoned, isolated Dietrich Bonhoeffer questioning the very same. In this paper I analyze Bonhoeffer’s concrete yet complex definition of Christ-as-community to explore the questions: 1) What and where is Christ-as-community? and 2) Can this community exist in virtual form? In identifying Christ-as-community as necessarily incarnate and intimate, and in locating it in the world, at the center, I argue that the virtual church is disembodied, discarnate, superficial, and illusory in a world that is fundamentally made of flesh. Leaving open the possibility of the Spirit’s movement in cyberspace, I call the church to remember Bonhoeffer’s Christ-as-community, and to re-member the digital church.