A pediatrician recently asked one of Emily Harrison's children a logical question, during pre-exam paperwork: Do you have a smartphone?

Doctors often ask children practical questions, such as whether they're getting enough sleep, have seen changes in their appetites or have started playing sports. These days, they may ask about anxiety or depression.

A smartphone question makes sense after years of research into how these devices, and social-media programs, affect mental and physical health. The question is why church leaders are not discussing these issues in sermons and education programs, said Harrison, author of the "Dear Christian Parent" online newsletter.

"This is a safety issue, yet we're hesitant to say it's a safety issue," she said, reached by Zoom. In churches, that might sound like: "If you allow this then you are a bad parent." Thus, clergy may be reluctant to offer smartphone warnings, even though "we make statements on many other topics all of the time for kids inside the church."

Pastors seem to be "afraid of backlash. … I think church leaders are way out of touch on this, because what parents are looking for is somebody to give them a firm line, a stance to take," she added. In other words: "This stuff is not for kids -- period."

It's important that politicians in powerful states such as California and New York have banned, or severely restricted, student smartphone use during school hours, noted Harrison. It has become normal for these issues to be discussed openly, especially since the 2024 release of the "The Anxious Generation," by social psychologist Jonathan Haidt of New York University.

"There isn't a debate, anymore, about whether this is safe for kids," she said. "So, why won't the church say so?"

For most parents, said Harrison, the question is not "if" children get phones, but "when."  In a recent essay, "On Giving My 15 Year Old a Cellphone," she walked readers through the digital, and moral, issues raised by the various devices sold by cellular-service providers.

First, there is an old-school option -- a "flip phone," with a tiny screen. However, Harrison discovered that most of these devices now have Internet browsers.