A recent article in The Wall Street Journal observes that it took the radio 38 years to reach 50 million people. The television took 16 years; the internet took 4; and Facebook reached the same size audience in only 2 years. Those numbers illustrate the speed with which networking and communication is changing; but it also says something about our notions of truth.
For twenty-first century Americans, truth is data. It can be assembled, elaborated, and disseminated. Put it another way, we equate information with the truth.
What is harder to discern is what, out of a veritable mountain of data, is true; and from what we count as true, we find it difficult what to say is the significance of what we know.
In John’s gospel, which makes famous use of the word truth, and, more generally, throughout Scripture, truth is something far more profound than data or information.
Truth lives, loves, and frees.
More on all three truths about truth in the days to come.
