Seeing God in Emojis: Visio Divina

Lately, I’ve found myself lingering a little longer on emojis. Maybe it’s because they’ve seeped into almost every part of how we communicate—smiles, prayers, reactions, even entire stories now reduced to a handful of symbols.  At first glance, they feel trivial, just playful punctuation in our digital dialogues. But I’ve started to wonder: what if these tiny icons are more than just filler? What if they can be sacred?                  

That question brought Visio Divina to mind—“divine seeing.” I’ve practiced it before with traditional icons or photos of nature, letting an image draw me into stillness and prayer. But what would happen if I applied that same sacred gaze to something like a heart emoji ❤️, a cross ✝️, or a dove 🕊️? It sounds odd, maybe even irreverent—but isn’t that what faith does? It nudges us to find God in unexpected places.

So I gave it a try. I sat quietly and chose an emoji that resonated—🕊️ for peace, that day—and simply looked. I asked God, What are You showing me here? And what stirred wasn’t just an image, but a presence. A memory. A wordless prayer. Even in that small, digital symbol, the Spirit spoke.

It humbled me. Something so small—a single pixelated image—had opened a space for encounter. But maybe that’s the point. Jesus often used the smallest things—a mustard seed, a lost coin, a child—to reveal the kingdom. Why wouldn’t He meet us through the very pixels we tap each day?

I’m beginning to see emojis as a kind of digital iconography, especially for those of us trying to live faithfully in online spaces. I’ve seen creators use them to tell gospel stories—✝️➡️🌅➡️🙌—and churches weaving them into digital prayers. They cross language barriers effortlessly. A simple 🕯️ or🙏 can carry comfort, hope, or solidarity across the globe in seconds.

Not everyone will see it this way. Some may say it trivializes the sacred. But maybe it’s not about the symbol itself, but how we approach it. If we bring reverence and curiosity to even the most ordinary images, they can become holy ground.

For me, this is a quiet invitation to remember: God meets us where we are—even in our texts, even on our screens. The digital world isn’t separate from the spiritual one. And maybe, just maybe, every emoji we send carries more than emotion—it carries grace.