Posted on 11/24/2007 6:53:25 AM PST by paltz
Organized religon is a MESS!
Of course, in churches with sacraments, all this is impossible. Or, if this kind of thing (use of recordings, projected videos, slide projectors, etc.) IS done, it is a gross liturgical abuse.
This is a poorly organized article. It conflates high-tech services and “worship” over the Internet with the use of modern technology to communicate with the congregation. I can understand why people would dislike services that combine a rock concert with a marketing presentation ... but that’s hardly the same as getting an e-mail from the office with a reminder that the youth group will be doing a service project on Thursday night!
You think that's bad, try joining a disorganized religion! :-)
That’s entertainment!
As a longtime media director for two churches, large and small, I have a few thoughts about this subject. Unfortunately, I have to run for now, so I will comment when I return.
We are a Lutheran - Missouri Synod church that uses a projector, but only to show the liturgy and the lyrics to the hymns. Very rarely, we will use a movie clip to illustrate a sermon - and I mean once a year.
Life church her in OKC has several locations. The preacher is at one of them..... the others just watch together via closed circuit television. And I mean groups of hundreds watching movie screen size television together in a “worship” service.
Please share your views. This article is not organized enough to draw conclusions.
Maybe Virgil and Catherine each wrote separate articles, and then the newpaper merged them together in alternating paragraphs.
There is no corporate worship in the New Testament.
“I think God would be pleased with this,” said the Rev. Grainger Browning Jr., pastor of the 10,000-member Ebenezer AME Church in Fort Washington, Md. “I don’t think that God would want us to try to evangelize like Jesus did 2,000 years ago.”
Or would he? Critics of high-tech churches contend that the big screens, flickering lights and Internet take away from the traditional atmosphere. They also say that some churches are using so much high technology that they look and feel more like entertainment venues than houses of worship.
Oh, for crying out loud. I'm sick of hearing people complain about change simply because it's change. Nothing stays the same forever. Change is usually for the better. In this case, this church is reaching more people through technology than without it. This is a good thing. If people are complaining about a camera and a projector in a church, I suspect they have their priorities screwed up.
As an LCMS'r myself, and a staunch supporter of traditional Liturgy and Hymnody, I find myself torn over the issue of large screens driven by PowerPoint. I have been to churches with such screens which were used to show the lyrics to hymns and order of worship. I found them quite helpful (much to my consternation) to my aging eyesight.
Exactly! No need for quiet contemplation, listening to God and your heart, listening to the joy and song of others. Just another 90 minute TV show without commercials.
Most of us can recite the liturgy from memory, but we have our Books of Common Prayer to refer to, as well as our Hymnals for the hymns. If extra material is required, such as when we recently began singing more of the liturgy, it's handed out on paper. Our main concession to "technology" is the wireless "baby monitor" used to transmit the service, and the sermon, to the nursery.
Certain special events have brought out cameras, but we are discussing methods for eliminating flashes.
Why don’t you have HYMNALS and MISSALS?
Well, he's on the right track, but a sermon isn't prayer- it's one guy talking to a roomful of listeners.
He's tapping into the impetus for the house church movement, though- people are sick of showing up, prepared to minister to others, and getting zero opportunity- since all the "real ministers" get to stand up on a stage with amped mics and instruments, and the order of service is very neatly scripted. So people get tired of being scripted into a charade, and leave. They would rather actually minister to someone in the real world, than the fake world of churchianity.
A little openness is good for spiritual development, and powerpoint, etc. doesn't help spontaneity.
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