Author: Michael Toy

Michael Toy is an amateur theologian, studying at Princeton Theological Seminary. Having studied media studies at Wheaton College under Dr. Read Schuchardt, Michael hopes to more fully dissect and analyze the intersection between theology and media ecology within the academic and the ecclesial settings.

Antagonism on YouTube: Metaphor in Online Discourse

There are a few corners of the digital world that I leave unvisited in order to preserve my sanity, namely the dark net, my ex’s Facebook page, and YouTube comments.  Stephen Pihlaja braves the last of these domains in his monograph Antagonism on YouTube: metaphor in online discourse (London: Bloomsbury, 2014).  In six chapters spanning […]

More Than a “Like”: Social Media Presence as Pastoral Care

Death and dying are never easy topics to broach. In some cultures, it is taboo to speak or even hint at death. But despite the silence around the topic, death never ceases to march on, ferrying souls from this world to the next. In the digital age the landscape of discussion is changing. No topic […]

Jana Marguerite Bennett’s “Aquinas on the Web?”: A Review

Jana Marguerite Bennett, Aquinas on the Web? Doing Theology in an Internet Age, New York: T&T Clark, 2012, 200 pages, $37.20. Like Jesus’ critics who wondered, “Can anything good come out of Galilee?” I often wonder, “Can anything good come out of Ohio?”  But a recent book, Aquinas on the Web? Doing Theology in an […]

Are TED Talks the New Sermon?

The digital age is invading our society like the army of locusts in Joel’s ambiguous prophecy (Joel 2:1-17). We have been ushered into a world of bits, bytes, data, and meta-data. Our interpersonal interactions are changing, our businesses are changing, and even the wiring of our brain is changing (Carr, Jackson, Brynjolfsson). “Media is now […]

Steve Turner’s “Popcultured”: A Review

Steve Turner, in Popcultured: Thinking Christianly About Style, Media and Entertainment, takes on the daunting task of exploring the relationship Christianity ought to have with popular culture. Turner is addressing the stream of thought within Christendom that separates Christianity and popular culture. This book is not a theological treatise or a doctrinal handbook, “but it’s essentially […]

How (Not) to Date Like Jesus

Contrary to the claims of dozens of books found in Christian bookstores, or perhaps evidenced by those myriad books, the Bible does not include an instruction manual for dating like Jesus. One cannot imitate a celibate man if one wants to take steps in a road different from that of celibacy. Even the married exemplars […]

Present Shock and Paul

In haste, I broke open my fortune cookie, discarding the cardboard tasting shell, searching for that slip of paper of banal wisdom.  But to my surprise, there was nothing inside.  Thinking I must have missed it hidden within the folds of the golden-ochre pieces, I double-checked to no avail.  I had no fortune.  Maybe this […]