The Technocratic Temptation
How Modern Life Trains Us to Be Weak
Modern technology amplifies passivity.
It doesn’t just make life easier.
It slowly trains us to expect ease.
And a man trained to expect comfort is a man trained for fragility.
For most of my life I was firmly in the camp that technological progress was always good.
New gadget? Great.
New app? Even better.
Like a lot of people who grew up during the rise of the internet and smartphones, every new innovation just felt like obvious progress.
But over the past several years I’ve started to slow down and ask a different question:
What is this technology doing to me?
Not just what it allows me to do.
But what it is forming in me.
Because when we rush headlong into adopting new technologies, we often do so without considering the long-term effects they may have on our habits, our minds, and even our bodies.
Every tool changes the person who uses it.
Sometimes those changes are beneficial. But sometimes the consequences are subtle, delayed, and deeply formative.
Let’s call this the technocratic temptation: the belief that technological progress can advance indefinitely without shaping the people who live inside it.
Take our smartphones as an example. These pocket-living devices essentially hijack our brain’s dopamine system in a way that decreases our attention span, and has even been shown in research to decrease academic performance [1].
And today, the entire architecture of modern life and technology points in one direction: effortless living.
But effortlessness is incompatible with strength.
The Age of Cushioned Living
We live in an era where nearly everything is optimized for comfort.
Most of us rarely sit in silence.
Rarely break a sweat.
Rarely lift something heavy.
Rarely wait longer than a few seconds for gratification.
Rarely confront the limits of our own bodies.
The result is a life that feels smooth, padded, and frictionless.
We assume this is progress.
But the Church has long warned that comfort, when elevated to the level of cultural principle, becomes a kind of spiritual sedation.
Pope Francis addresses this reality directly in Laudato Si’:
“We have to accept that technological products are not neutral, for they create a framework which ends up conditioning lifestyles and shaping social possibilities…” (§107)
Our devices, our systems, our conveniences shape us long before we consciously recognize what is happening. They form our instincts and expectations about what life should feel like.
Smooth.
Efficient.
Immediate.
Effortless.
This has become an area my wife and I have been exploring recently in our own household.
For Lent, we decided to deliberately reduce our smartphone use. That might sound simple, but it quickly revealed how deeply embedded these devices are in our routines.
We use our phones for entertainment, of course. But we also use them to manage daily life. We order groceries through a “click list” service. We pay bills. We manage our budget. We coordinate schedules.
The very reasons we feel we need to keep our phones nearby are the same reasons they quietly shape our habits and attention.
Convenience rarely arrives without consequences.
It’s been a slow slog, but I find myself making progress. This past weekend, I got home from work on Friday, put my phone on the counter, and that’s where it lives until Monday morning. I checked it a couple of times over the weekend to see if I had any missed messages that required a response, but otherwise, there was no “scrolling” time for me this past weekend.
It opened up time and space to sped some time out int he garden, whittling with my boys, playing soccer with the family; activities that involved building callouses and sweating a bit, being out in the sun and the heat.
The Technocratic Temptation: How Modern Life Trains Us to Be Weak
Pope Francis warns that the systems and technologies of modern life often distance people from the realities that form character and virtue.
He writes:
“Many professionals, opinion makers, communications media and centres of power… live and reason from the comfortable position of a high level of development and a quality of life well beyond the reach of the majority of the world’s population.” (Laudato Si’, §49)
Comfort creates distance.
Distance from hardship.
Distance from labor.
Distance from the poor.
Distance from the limits of reality itself.
And when people become accustomed to comfort, they begin to assume that discomfort itself is a problem to be engineered away.
We see every friction point in our lives as something to be optimized away.
But Francis reminds us that technological systems shape society in deeper ways than we often realize:
“Technological products are not neutral… Decisions which may seem purely instrumental are in reality decisions about the kind of society we want to build.” (Laudato Si’, §107)
The society we are building today is one increasingly designed to eliminate friction.
But friction is where formation happens.
And when friction disappears, formation disappears with it.
Once comfort defines your relationship with the world, it eventually begins to define your relationship with others — even those you claim to love.
A Man Who Cannot Deny Himself Cannot Love.
Pope John Paul II reminds us of a fundamental truth about the human person:
“Man cannot live without love.” (Redemptor Hominis, §10)
But love, in the Christian understanding, is not mere affection or emotion. Church writers and theologians often refer to love as willing the good of the other.
That kind of love requires self-gift.
It calls for the voluntary offering of oneself in service of another.
John Paul II writes:
“Christ came not to be served but to serve… In order to serve others worthily and effectively we must be able to master ourselves.” (Redemptor Hominis, §21)
Self-mastery is the prerequisite for love.
A man who cannot deny himself cannot serve.
And a man who cannot serve cannot love.
Modern life, however, trains us in the opposite direction. It trains us to satisfy every impulse immediately. To eliminate inconvenience. To avoid hardship whenever possible.
But a life built around comfort cannot produce men capable of sacrifice.
And sacrifice is the foundation of love.
Atrophy Is What Happens When Resistance Disappears
In the physical world, this principle is obvious.
If we stop using our muscles, exercising our bodies, or applying resistance to our musculoskeletal system, those tissues begin to weaken.
This process is called atrophy.
Muscles shrink.
Strength declines.
Bones weaken.
Joints become unstable.
The body was built to encounter resistance.
Biology reveals a simple law that applies not only to muscles but to human life as a whole:
remove resistance, remove growth.
No Resistance, No Growth: The Law of Human Physiology
Research shows that resistance training can decrease joint stress, reduce age-related deterioration, and improve health outcomes. It does this through a whole host of benefits including:
Increasing muscle strength and mass
Balancing force distribution within joints
Increasing basal metabolic rate
Improving bone density
Reducing body fat and cardiac risk factors
Promoting cognitive function and psychological well-being
If that list doesn’t get you interested in resistance training and getting stronger, I don’t know what will.
Avoiding resistance doesn’t just weaken — it sickens.
The Hidden Health Crisis: Under-loading and Chronic Disease
Nearly half of the U.S. population now experiences some form of chronic musculoskeletal condition — from persistent back pain to degenerative arthritis.
Why?
The evidence increasingly points to three major factors:
rising obesity rates
sedentary lifestyles
a general lack of physical activity and resistance training
In other words, the modern body is chronically under-loaded.
We are living in environments designed to eliminate effort, while inhabiting bodies designed to require it.
So weakness starts to feel normal.
Pain becomes common.
And people assume deterioration is simply part of aging.
But the real issue is not aging.
It is under-use.
What’s True of the Body Is True of the Soul
Theodore Roosevelt once wrote:
“I believe in exercise for the body, always provided that we keep in mind that physical development is a means and not an end.” (1910)
Strength of body is not the final goal.
It is preparation.
Preparation to carry responsibility.
Preparation to serve others.
Preparation to endure hardship when life inevitably demands it.
The same principle applies to the soul.
Virtue is built through resistance.
Patience is built through inconvenience.
Courage is built through fear.
Discipline is built through restraint.
Faith is built through uncertainty.
Remove resistance and virtue begins to atrophy just like muscle.
The Only Way Out of Weakness Is Through Resistance
If modern life trains us toward weakness, the solution is not complicated — though it is demanding.
We must deliberately reintroduce resistance.
Lift heavy things.
Do difficult work.
Fast from comfort occasionally.
Serve others even when it costs you something.
Strength — physical, moral, and spiritual — grows the same way muscle does.
Through resistance.
And resistance, when embraced voluntarily, becomes the pathway to freedom.
Continued Reading
If you want to take a deep dive into each of the texts & resources that are quoted in this article, you can find the links to them below:
Francis, “Laudatory Si’” (24 May 2015)
Leo XIV, “Dilexi Te” (4 October 2025)
John Paul II, “Redemptor Hominis” (4 March 1979)