Looking Backwards and Forwards at the Study of Digital Religion

Abstract

Over the past three decades, there has been a steadily increasing interest in how religious communities and practices interact and intersect with digital media and emerging technologies. It was initially seen and documented in the late 1990s by scholars of Religion and Media as a novel phenomenon. Attention was paid to how tech-savvy religious groups sought to transport their traditional religious rituals online while others experimented with the ways Internet-based platforms and tools might give birth to new forms of religiosity. In these early days, scholars often focused their attention on investigating dominant exemplars, such as Christian communities' Internet use, and unique innovations of religion, such as Technopaganism and Wicca online. By the late 2000s, it became clear that adopting digital media-informed religious practices and translating religious beliefs into a digital landscape was becoming the norm rather than the exception in twenty-first century religion. The global COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 also forced many religious groups who had been technological laggards or resistant to reconsider the role technology might play in their religious practices. During this time, we saw a rise worldwide in many diverse religious communities' adoption of digital and mediated communication technologies or to continue their community gatherings and rituals during the periods of lockdowns and social distancing. As this 50th anniversary issues of Religion look back at the past developments in the study of religion and then speculates on our future inquiry into emerging forms of communal and individual religiosity and spirituality, I argue more attention needs to be paid to the role digital media and emerging technologies will play in both the practice and study of religion. In this short essay, I introduce the concept of digital religion, a term that proposes a distinctive way of understanding the practice of religion in digital spaces and cultures. Digital religion is both a theoretical approach to the study of contemporary religion and an academic area of inquiry that focuses attention on where and how religion appears in a network society. By providing an overview of the concept and study of digital religion, this essay maps a trajectory where scholars of religion might focus their attention in the years to come as technology plays an increasingly central part in social and religious culture globally. Over the past three decades, the intersection of contemporary religious beliefs and practices with digital spaces and emerging technology has been described as the study of cyber religion, virtual religion, and religion online and has come to be known as the study of digital religion. Digital religion, as I define it, draws attention to how digital media and technologies influence and shape religious beliefs, practices, communities, and expressions in the contemporary world. Specifically, digital religion “investigates the conceptual, technological and cultural space that is evoked when we talk about how online and offline religious spheres have become blended and integrated” (Campbell 2013a, 13). This is a unique approach to the study of how religious people, practices, and beliefs engage with digital media, cultures, and spaces. It goes beyond merely acknowledging the presence of religious content online but delves into understanding how digital platforms and tools have become an integral part of a human's religious experiences as part of their everyday lives. Much of the research within Digital Religion studies has focused on exploring how technology affects religious identity, community formation, rituals, engagement with religious teachings, and structures of religious authority. However, I emphasize that digital religion is not just about the replication of traditional religious practices in an online space but involves a transformation and adaptation of these practices within the digital realm. It involves the dynamic int