Isabel Brown on Being ‘Digital Missionaries’
The next panelist, author and podcaster Isabel Brown, said social media is the reason people hear the gospel for the first time every day. The concept of totally unplugging bothers her, she admitted, because technology offers ways for Christians to “have powerful impacts from the inside” of culture.
Brown, who was mentored by slain activist Charlie Kirk, pointed to him as an example of someone who effectively used social media for outreach. “We can use technology as a tool to restore what’s good and beautiful,” said Brown. Instead of becoming “mindless consumers” of AI and platforms, she encouraged followers of Christ to serve as digital missionaries.
“We’re called in God’s image to be creators, to build, engage, and bring light to people in the darkness,” Brown said. Through day-to-day connections and online comments, she added, Christians have more influence than well-known “celebrities with blue checkmarks” next to their names.
While attending the Vatican’s first Digital Missionaries Jubilee this summer, Brown learned that the Catholic Church calls today’s mission field a “digital continent.” Influencers, or creators, realize that people now “dwell” in technology and social media, Brown said, so “Christians have an obligation to go where people are dwelling and bring the gospel to them.”
Brown urged people not to “run away from technology or treat it as the source of all evil.” The pro-life advocate and new mom cited positive uses of AI, such as the creation of powerful, immersive visuals of human life inside the womb.
Tech users must remain disciplined and intentional, Brown said. She advised church leaders and other workers not to use AI “to do work that you can do yourself” or to “limit human flourishing and potential.”
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Brown recommended Charlie Kirk’s upcoming book “Stop, in the Name of God: Why Honoring the Sabbath Will Transform Your life.” Her late friend practiced a “digital Sabbath” one day per week, she said, abstaining from technology to spend time with God and his family. But during the other six days, she said, Kirk used tech to “run headfirst into culture and try to change it.”
