Computers, and the internet at large, offer a form of pure communication that our forefathers only dreamed about. It offers you the chance to speak to another human, unclouded by judgement of looks or mannerisms. You see them only for their ideas, rather than their physical form. Canada's University of Mantinoba has a great write up about it.
Here are some choice quotes:
Human evolution will follow the model of technology in terms of mass connectivity, and become a collective mind. Others believe that a collective mind will be enabled by the technology, and minds will be hooked up or wired into the Internet just as computers are. An aspect of this idea is omniscience, the ability of a person who is logged into the net to "know all" or even "be all" by virtue of the connections that it grants them. The mind becomes likened to a computer; thoughts and emotions as well as anything else are processed as "files." If this is true, then it is possible to take the contents of a person's biological brain and upload them into a form of digital brain that physically does not deteriorate: instant immortality. Cyberspace allows users to transcend their bodies, as many religions aim towards. To me, these qualities make the Internet into a place, which allows people to recreate themselves as a version of their own god. Omniscience, immortality, transcending the body-all these things are classic goals or qualities of spiritual enlightenment or spiritual control.
While the article was written in 2001, a lot of it is still very relevant to our current lives.Wertheim (1999) has worked with the idea that cyberspace is a new version of Heaven, this time created by humans and not God. Part of her ideas rest in the basis that the tradition of the Western world to separate the mind and body has lead to the ideas that qualities that are not physical become equated with the mind (Wertheim 1999:149). Interestingly, the mind also includes spiritual qualities and beliefs. Thus, the Internet is largely a spiritual "space" somewhere in the ether. It becomes part of the Christian concept of Heaven through this link, but also holds a promise of the sacred to many people. One thing that is important to remember, though, is that this version of Heaven is under our direct control. There is no intermediary of the priest and other clergy, or barriers of divine beings that work for God. We are directly connected to technology that allows us divine creation. We can create our own utopic worlds online-the act of creating somehow becoming important once we realize we can have our own six days, and own a web page. But if you know how, creating the world can only take about six hours. Somehow, in a crucial way, the Internet has begun to allow democratic belief systems, or belief systems independent of control to exist as a large presence. To some extent, this is because cyberspace works with a form of power relations that render hierarchies of power and control in religion as unnecessary. There is no one person that must be accessed in order to attain spiritual enlightenment. There are multiple sources that allow each and every person who accesses them to work at their spirituality on their own level.