Leadership Journal

The band is rockin', arms are swayin', and you're about to come on screen in high definition with such stunning visual clarity that even people in the nosebleed seats can see your perfect smile.

Is this a rock concert? A beer commercial? Or just a typical Sunday morning?

These days, it could be any of the above.

Whether you're a questioning congregant, a concerned pastor, or a perplexed professor studying the effects of media on religious practice (like me), the use of technology in the worship setting is worth considering.

Media are not neutral. Like ideas, they have consequences, especially in the church. And some of these consequences should give us pause. In Technopoly media theorist Neil Postman writes, "A preacher who confines himself to considering how a medium can increase his audience will miss the significant question: In what sense do new media alter what is meant by religion, by church, even by God?"

Given the impact of new media, we should carefully consider the medium of Christ's message.

We don't want to reduce our religion to an ideology that is but one of many in a marketplace of ideologies. Nor do we want to make the mistake of having the medium we deploy compromise the authority of the message we proclaim.

Image is King

Two years ago the Chicago Tribune redesigned their paper to be more image and web-friendly. They simultaneously eliminated half of their staff—mostly the word people.

This illustrates an undeniable reality: In our society, the written word is no longer the dominant mode of communication. Instead it is visual media comprised of pictures, film, video, symbols, logos, and certain art forms. And our culture worships the images they convey to us. It is no coincidence that film is the most expensive art form we practice and that actors are revered as royalty. We typically place the TV in the place of honor in our homes, a place in other cultures reserved for the family shrine. We pay the most money for those whose image we most want to see, which is why the visually mediated—athletes and movie stars—are the highest paid individuals in our society. These images now consume eight hours (in media consumption) of the average American's day. And their ubiquity makes them invisible to us, leading us to overlook their impact. If you're tagging yourself on your friend's Facebook page right now, or reading this article while watching American Idol, or saving for a wider and flatter TV, then I've got news for you. God may be your co-pilot, but the Image is in the driver's seat.

If the church wishes to emulate our image-obsessed culture, it must also invest in the visual and reduce the emphasis on words. Here's a formula for how a church could do it:

Get a celebrity pastor (young, good-looking, charismatic with a powerful stage presence—all perfect qualities for the image culture)

Multiply his impact by super-sizing his image in the churches via giant LCD projector.

Create network affiliate stations and channels to broadcast images of this celebrity.

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