Introduction
“I’m a doom-scroller.”
That’s the admission of Katie, a 26-year-old speech therapist from Columbus Ohio when talking with Christopher Curley, writer for the website Healthline. She constantly checks her social media and news feeds—Twitter and Facebook being her main sites, but she also looks at Google for news. She admits that since the start of the pandemic, her habit has increased significantly, and confesses she has a problem. “I do it with the intention of lessening my anxiety, but it makes me more anxious.”
New York psychologist, Dr. Ariane Ling states, “The pandemic has exacerbated these habits in many ways, including the fact that there is no shortage of doomsday news. This created both less barriers to being informed, but it also adds to the abundance of doomsday headlines.”
And that is the pandemic within a pandemic—Doom-Scrolling— the act of scrolling news apps and social media non-stop, endlessly taking in bad news.
If doom-scrolling is part of your daily routine, you are not alone. Twitter use has jumped 24 percent since the start of the pandemic last year, and Facebook is up 27 percent. We think keeping up with the latest news is a good thing and will lessen our anxiety, but it increases it.
Doom-scrolling is an “unsatisfying addiction,” says clinical psychiatrist Dr. Patricia Celan. “People are hypervigilant for danger and are more likely to seek information in hopes of finding a way to control the problem.”
Fascinating, isn’t it? We actually dive deep into doom and gloom in an effort to control it. But instead of making us feel safer, it raises our level of stress, anxiety, and fear. Does this sound or feel familiar?
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On this Easter Sunday—this particular Easter, in 2021—the lectionary falls on Mark’s Gospel account of the resurrection, easily the least joyous telling: What is happening? Run away! What do we do now? We are scared.
It’s the fitting Gospel account for 2021 where we look back over the last year, the last few weeks even, and we are reeling with emotion and ask similar questions as we take in the news around us… 3 mass shootings in 3 weeks. The Derek Chauvin trial. Reports of a fourth wave of COVID-19. A Capital police officer killed in the line of duty on Friday. Just to name a few.
But today is Easter—and we have on fine clothes and joyful faces, and know it’s Resurrection Sunday. But let’s be honest… Still within in us is a roller coaster of emotions.
Its Easter morning, but we’ve come to this Easter just as the women came to the first Easter morning…with doom in our hearts and spirits. What then will we do? How will we respond?
Move 1
Mark’s tells us when the Sabbath was over, “…very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us…?”
They were understandably feeling doom. Their Messiah had been killed in a humiliating death on a cross. His body had been laid in a cave-like tomb, and a large stone sealed it off. They were feeling grief over the death of Jesus, stress about how they would move the stone, and anxiety about the future.
Anxiety is a feeling of fear about what is to come, and that’s exactly what the women were experiencing. Minute by minute, their mental health was eroding; their spirits were breaking more and more. All they could see and feel was fear, stress, anxiety, doom, and gloom.
But it was Easter—the first Easter—and things were going to be different. It would still be an emotional roller-coaster but this time—finally—among the emotions was hope. Hope that was filled with possibilities to transform fear, stress, anxiety—doom and gloom— into power, love, and new life. They would just have to go a little further into their emotions and a little further to see Jesus.
Move 2
On that first Easter, the women going to the tomb, and all of Jesus’ followers were caught in the doom of what had happened; and in what they didn’t understand was happening. As a result, they were on an emotional roller-coaster, and theprimary emotion was that of suffering. And the same is true for us today.
In the midst of all that is happening, in the midst of all the doom and gloom around us, even in the midst of joy filled moments, a part of us is still suffering.
And here’s the truth… Suffering happens. It happens to the good and the bad; the clever and the clueless; the rich and the poor; the devout and the profane. Despite all our best efforts, we fall and we fail. “Bad things happen to good people”, as Kushner says. Pain, loss, and eventually death will visit each of us. But doomsday news and doom-scrolling exacerbates this reality with a much dimmer perspective.
One day we’re planning a wedding, looking forward to a graduation, anticipating a big promotion, bouncing grandkids on our knee. But beware! Be hyper-vigilant! Because the next day an angry man with an assault weapon could enter a local business and pointless suffering and death ensues.
Is this what life today is, now? That’s a question of suffering, and if we try to answer it alone, if we try to control it, we will only suffer.
But thank God for Easter. The day that redefines all of life and tells us we never suffer alone again. Jesus changes everything, today, not with words— rather with his birth, life, crucifixion, his resurrection. He answers the question of suffering with power, love, and new life.
The next question becomes then: On Easter—How do we let him? How do we move from the addiction of taking in endless doom and gloom and move to the hope, power, love, and new life of Easter? Well we need only look at the women at the tomb who show us the answer is actually found in their; and our, suffering.
Move 3
Suffering is not just part of being human. Being human, truly human, means we are always going deeper into our humanity, and suffering implores us to go deeper. But to go deeper requires us to face facts… And a fact is, on most days we’re running on automatic pilot. We don’t ask why we’re here; we don’t ask why we get out of bed in the morning—we just get out of bed, hit the floor running, and go about the tasks we have to get done.
But suffering? Suffering jolts us out of an unreflective life and leads us to search our hearts for our reason for living—to search for meaning.
Suffering happens—spouses and parents die; cancer strikes; health, wealth, and jobs come and go, leaving us understandably lost and scared—and our “meaning” in life can get lost too. But “meaning” is what makes life worth living. And Easter, thanks to be God, is filled with meaning.
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When we look at the crucified and resurrected Jesus, we see that God is with us—especially in our suffering—the terrible moments we had hoped to avoid, and the shameful moments we’ve tried to keep hidden.
No matter what happens, no matter how harrowing or embarrassing or shocking life gets, God shows up. But note: God is not getting a detached look at this life. God is embracing us in all of life’s doom and gloom and suffering. Which means the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus reveals God’s “meaning”— and the “meaning of Easter” is relentless, unflinching love given to all.
In Christ, God goes down to the grave with us— into every grave we tumble into in this life, including the final one. And because God is, well, God; that relentless, unflinching love is more than mushy sentimental affection.
God’s love is power— the same power that brought this vast universe into being; the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. And that power; that relentless, unflinching love; brings life—a whole new kind of life—life out of death. Which means God’s love makes suffering the birthplace of eternal life.
Theologian Richard Rohr put it this way in his book “The Crucified Jesus” saying, “If all of our human crucifixions are leading to some possible resurrection, and are not dead-end tragedies, this changes everything. If God is somehow participating in our human suffering, instead of just passively tolerating it and observing it, that also changes everything.”
God’s power and relentless, unflinching love transforms us. Not just in the next life, but already in this life. With it we become, as Paul says, a new creation in Christ. (2 Corinthians 5:17) Because of Easter we become a new creation. And everything changes.
Move 4
Experts say the solution to doom-scrolling is to “break out of the vicious cycle of negativity.” Easier said than done—but it can be done. We can put down our phones, turn off our televisions, go cold turkey on our endless scrolling. But no…escaping doom and gloom is not that simple.
But Easter…Easter, and its meaning, can help us start. Doom-scrolling traps us in a vicious cycle of negativity that fuels our anxiety. “Our minds are wired to look out for threats,” says Dr. Amelia Aldao, director of a clinic that specializes in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy called Together CB-T. “The more time we spend scrolling, the more we find those dangers, the more we get sucked into them, the more anxious we get. But what if we replaced a vicious cycle with a virtuous cycle? What if we turned away from threats and looked for new possibilities?”
And that is the meaning Easter presents to us—the opportunity to see past the doom and gloom and look for new possibilities. This is what Jesus was doing when he went ahead of his Disciples, calling them to Galilee. And it’s what he is doing by going ahead of us today. Jesus is rolling away stones and calling us forward—to new possibilities—possibilities beyond our screens; possibilities not of doom, but of hope and new life—even in the midst of suffering.
Conclusion
Today, possibilities have been revealed to us. The cross reveals God’s relentless, unflinching love. The empty tomb reveals God’s power. Easter morning reveals that in our suffering, God is present, giving meaning to our lives with the promise of new possibilities.
Yes, there will still be stress, anxiety, and fear—doom and gloom. Yes, there will still be suffering and death—but when we dare to go deeper into the suffering we find what today truly means for every day—new life for all, no matter what.
So let us to look neither at the past, nor at just today. Let us look to the future today promises. Let us face the doom and gloom of the world by going deeper into the suffering around us, allowing it, and Jesus, to jolt us and move us toward new possibilities for deeper meaning in our lives.
For when we do, we find our risen Lord is not simply with us— he is also ahead of us, calling us into a future where he empowers us to look beyond the narrowness of a doom filled screen and see that nothing but love and new life ever gets to have the last word. For that is the meaning of Easter. Happy Easter. Amen.
Pastoral Prayer, April 4, 2021, Easter Sunday
On this glorious Easter morn O God, we have gathered in your presence to rejoice in the light of the empty tomb. The stone has been rolled away, both from the tomb and from the depths of our hearts. We once again have the opportunity to live in the power of the risen Christ whose promise for a hope filled future fills our spirits.
God of new life, we cannot adequately express what today means to us because we know that today means forever with you is assured. But we cannot find the words also because the ways of this world, the doom and gloom of it all, robs us of the ability to see beyond what’s in front of us, let alone eternity.
And because of this, we come to the empty tomb today like the women who first came—filled with stress, anxiety, and fear. Even though we have come to this day for a joyous celebration, we must admit, we are still suffering.
So just as you did with your Son, move us from death to new life we pray; enabling us to see all the possibilities that come from resurrection. Make us confident in the truth that Jesus goes ahead of us, making a way through the suffering of this world that will always lead to new life. For that is how we want to live on this side of the resurrection—as those who know and embody the meaning of Easter—that because of this day, death never gets the last word—only and always is your love final.
So as we are raised with Christ to a new life of hope and service, let the joy of this Good News fill our spirits and mend our broken hearts. Let the hope of this Good News burst forth from us and encapsulate the world around us—shining a light of hope into the doom and gloom.
For that is what Easter will always mean. Help us live this meaning, today, and every day.
We ask that you would hear now the prayers that come from our hearts, as we offer them in this time of Holy Silence.
All this we pray in the name of our risen Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ, who taught us to pray saying, “Our…”