A remnant emerges in the tech community

Over the past several months there has been a peculiar development: Some of the leading figures in Silicon Valley appear to be embracing (or moving closer to) conservatism. From Elon Musk to Mark Zuckerberg, there have been a number of public and private examples of the tech community making statements or changes that signal a new détente between the Valley and Republicans.

While this trend is noticeable, it fails to reflect the reality that Silicon Valley and conservatism are still at odds. In reality, the vast majority of Silicon Valley voted for Democrats in 2024 even if Trump made small gains, as he did across the nation. In the summer it was noted by ABC that prominent Venture Capitalists and tech founders overwhelmingly lined up and gave generously in support of Kamala Harris.

To this end the L.A. Times recently published an essay by John Markoff and Lenny Siegel that argued (almost as if to reassure their audiences) that Republicans are not in fact popular. The duo take painstaking detail to prove that “Silicon Valley’s shift from blue to red is a mirage.”

Even beyond shifting political dynamics of Silicon Valley, one thing is clear, it is absolutely not popular to be an evangelical Christian. This trope is as true now as it was seven years ago when the HBO series Silicon Valley famously made a joke out of the fact that it was more socially devasting to be “outed” as a Christian than anything else.

This is why we should be encouraged by the emergence of an intrepid group of evangelical Christians who started the ACTS 17 Collective to share a “message that connects for spiritual skeptics grinding away in Big Tech or at a startup.” ACTS 17 is both an acronym—Acknowledging Christ in Technology and Society—as well as a reference to the story in Acts where the Apostle Paul preached the gospel at the Areopagus.

Started by the husband/wife tech duo Trey and Michelle Stephens, this group is creating unique opportunities to engage unbelievers with, as the San Francisco Standard put it, a “message that connects for spiritual skeptics grinding away in Big Tech or at a startup.”

As Michelle explained to The New York Times, ACTS 17 is not trying to make Christianity seem more palatable to unbelievers but is about facilitating a transformation. “After an ACTS 17 event, all we would like is for folks in attendance to take a next step in their faith journey,” Ms. Stephens said. “Maybe they’d never heard of Jesus, and a next step is reading the Bible.” The Collective is planning to spread their footprint beyond California and engage in cities across the nation.

On a personal note, I met Trey and Michele at a gathering late last year ironically called Hereticon, a “conference for thoughtcrime.” Before attending I was nervous about being at this gathering. Would I be out of place? How does my faith fit in here? But in meeting Michelle we discussed how the truth of our faith is in every way a thoughtcrime against the rest of the world. Instead of hiding my faith I should be emboldened to participate and engage. As Christians we proclaim the truth of the gospel that Christ came to redeem the world. Through his death and resurrection we have been saved, these ideas that are an anathema to unbelievers.

This boldness was recently expressed by Michelle’s husband, Trey, who wrote an essay for Pirate Wires articulating his warning that newly developed “companion bots” are incredibly dangerous for the future of marriage and relationships. He draws on his faith and Christian marriage to further articulate the real harms of these technologies.

While not exactly Silicon Valley, we saw Wesley Huff demonstrate how to share the gospel faithfully, addressing core intellectual skepticism that is shared by many in the tech world. In his interviews with Billy Carson and Joe Rogan we see Huff confidently reference scripture, history, and academic research to cut through arguments of skeptics in ways that frustrated Carson but also sparked real curiosity from Joe Rogan and his millions of listeners.

As the old song goes “Hide my candle under a bushel? No! I’m going to let it shine.” We know the truth of the gospel and should share that truth whether through our church, in our community, on the foreign mission field, or even to the tech geeks in Silicon Valley building the next AI model.

We need a remnant to speak up for truth and boldly demonstrate how our faith transforms lives. I am hopeful this is a beginning, that strategic efforts to reach the lost among Silicon Valley skeptics will continue to grow.