Yesterday’s Read It! blog needs to be followed up with this story about Pope Francis asking folks to prevent Brain Rot by avoiding social media. Sean Craig, writing on the Daily Beast, January 27, 2025, reported:

The leader of the Roman Catholic Church calls on his followers to abstain from a lot. Pope Francis’ latest request: stop scrolling. The Vatican head, 88, told an audience at the Jubilee of the World of Communications in Rome at the weekend that too much social media should be avoided because it causes “brain rot”—or putrefazione cerebrale in the more elegant Italian. “Let’s put respect for the highest and noblest part of our humanity back in the center of our hearts, let’s avoid filling it with what rots and makes it rot,” he told an audience of thousands of writers and journalists. “The choices of each of us count, for example, in expelling that ‘brain rot’ caused by the addiction to continuous scrolling on social media, defined by the Oxford Dictionary as the word of the year.”

Good stuff. But I think the Pope missed it when he prescribed a cure:

The pontiff added that the “cure for this disease” is education, especially for young people to ensure they are equipped with media literacy and critical thinking beyond the pull of constantly refreshing feeds.

Education is fine, I guess, but I would say that the cure, for believers, is more time meditating on the Word! I wonder if Psalm 1.1 could apply to too much time on social media:

Oh, the joys of those who do not follow evil men’s advice, who do not hang around with sinners, scoffing at the things of God. (Psalm 1.1, TLB)

Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers. (Psalm 1.1, NIV)

The cure is clear:

But they delight in doing everything God wants them to, and day and night are always meditating on his laws and thinking about ways to follow him more closely. They are like trees along a riverbank bearing luscious fruit each season without fail. Their leaves shall never wither, and all they do shall prosper. (Psalm 1.2, 3, TLB)

“Always meditating on his laws” results in “Their leaves shall never wither…” That is, no brain rot! (Our meditation on Psalm 19 also suggests no brain rot for those who are in the Word.)

Back to my son’s pastor:

Read it!

I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies, As much as in all riches. I will meditate on Your precepts, And contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word. (Psalm 119.14 – 16, NKJV)

I thought about my ways, And turned my feet to Your testimonies. I made haste, and did not delay To keep Your commandments. (Psalm 119.59, 60, NKJV)