Impact of Modernity on Spiritualism

There is no doubt that modernity has had a major impact on religion. In my opinion,
the impact has not been positive. Modernity has generally weakened people’s attachment to
religion. I have reached this conclusion based on the observations of how my friends and I
relate with religion. For instance, I personally spend more time on the internet chatting with
my friends on various social media sites, watching movies and music, and playing video
games than I spend on reading the Bible, going to Bible studies, or even attending church.
Thus, thanks to technology, I spend less time on religious activities compared to religious
ones.

Apart from reducing time that people spend on religious activities, modern technology
has also reduced people’s beliefs in supernatural powers and forces that are at the core of
religious practices and beliefs. This change in attitudes toward supernatural forces can be
attributed to a central aspect of modernity – scientific and technological advancements.
Thanks to technological and scientific advancement, many people now believe that human
beings, and not supernatural beings such as God, can and should solve humanity’s problems.
For instance, while my grandparents and great grandparents would be comfortable with the
idea of praying to God to heal a disease such as cancer, many of my friends and I prefer to
place our hopes in medical and scientific research rather than God. Thus, one consequence of
scientific and technological advancements has been to weaken people’s beliefs in
supernatural forces, powers, and beings.

Another aspect of modernity that has had a generally negative effect on religion is the
emergence of social media. Many of my friends spend a lot of time on social media sites,
such as Instagram. Combined with movies and television shows, popular sites such as

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Instagram promote a culture of materialism and glamor. Thus, for many people, the quest to
achieve material success has become more important than spiritualism which usually
considers a successful life as one lived according to the will of God.