Possibilities of Tech in the Worship Space #1: On the Projector Screen

On the use of Projector screens:


Some of you may know my feelings about projector screens, however that is not the point of this first post in the new series of Possibilities of Tech in the Worship Space.


The fact of the matter is that there are a lot of exciting possibilities with this form of worship direction. However a poorly done projector screen can sour people on the possibilities of projector screens. Most of the time it seems that the reason people run away from technology, or pretty much anything, is bad experiences. Everyone has that place they won't go back to because they found a hair in their soup or got food poisoning. Although it may have been an isolated event, one could admit the possibility that it was a one time thing and eventually might go back.


So lets take a look at what can make or break the usage of projector screens in worship.


1. Positioning


In simple terms of pictures:
                          Doing it right

This is beautiful. All be it costly, the projector screens are incorporated as apart of the church. They are not sticking out as though they were placed there as an after thought.


It is not out of the way and awkward for the most part, nor does it obscure the altar. In European western churches, such as us Lutherans, we have more of a challenge in trying to work around traditional appointments. Baptists and other "low church" traditions don't have as much to worry about.


This example has a nice compromise between the easy of sight and reverence to the space. While two screens have a lot of benefit for the worshiper, they can draw people away from the main event. The LBW's Manual on the Liturgy identifies the Eucharist as the central event of worship, so one might be careful about where your screens draw the eyes. It might be good to shut them off during Eucharist. A single screen may be impractical for large churches, but it creates a unity of sight that even hymnals can't achieve.
                                                                                                              Doing it Wrong
                  
                                                                  


Although this may not be the permanent position, it demonstrates everything that can go wrong in screen placement. It blocks everything beautiful about this space. It creates space within a space. The beauty of this sanctuary is neglected. It is however, an example of screen integration with an older sanctuary. The other picture showed seamless integration while this one does not have that ability.


In this placement, the screen takes the place of the altar. One needs to ask "How does this reflect on our liturgy?" One must keep in mind what is the central event of worship? For a traditional Lutheran worship, and probably modern ones, this is the Eucharist.


So far we have some basic principles to consider:

• Can it be seen easily?
• Does stick out like a sore thumb?
• Where is the focus of worship after the screen is introduced?
• What does the screen obscure?
• Is the screen properly utilizing the space?

2. Worship leaders and the Screen

The Worship leaders should never use the same screen as the worshipers.

I'm sorry, this is an absolute. It kills any sort of flow if the worship leader keeps looking over his or her shoulder to check his or her lines. Simply: Don't do it!

Image with me if you will, if your pastor kept running down to check your hymnal for the words of institution. Your Pastor would never do this. In the same way your Pastor or worship leader should never be using the same screen as the congregation. It's distracting. Unless they are beginning at the back of the sanctuary before a procession.

Solutions:

Lets take a page out of the newscaster's hymnal. 

First of all, yes that is an iPad teleprompter. Pretty sweet! And a good, possibly more cost effective plan.

At Holy Shepherd in Newark California, they had this concept in practice. I was amazed, the congregation was using the projector while the Pastor had the teleprompter in the back.

The result was one that was even better than the usage of the service book at the altar. Now the pastor wasn't looking over her shoulder, nor staring down into a book. She was looking toward the congregation. It made for a very charming worship experience.

So what a congregation could do:

• At the very least, the leaders should continue to use the text instead of looking over their shoulder. This has the benefit of being cost effective for the church can not afford a teleprompter or similar device in addition to a projector and projector screen.
• Create a superior worship experience with a teleprompter, projector or no projector. Whether you have a projector screen or not, this is a great idea. If a church can afford it, I recommend this before your church invests in a projector screen. Hymnal or no hymnal, this can create a great sense of intimacy and welcome.
• Worship leaders should never look over their shoulders. Period.

3. What is lost and what is gained?

Pros:                                                                                               Cons:

-Worship is easier to follow, I don't think 
this was ever contested                                                      -Perhaps a distraction, does it make  

                                                                                                  worship into television or some sort   of show?                                      

-Saves paper, greener is better                                                          

-Done well, it can be great boon                                                     -Done poorly, it can destroy the experience                                                                                                             the experience

In the end, is a projector screen more distracting than a hymnal? We go from everyone staring into their own books, to everyone staring at the same screen. Is that really worse than hymnals? I still prefer the hymnals, more on a point of church unity, this being a very first world appointment. However one can see the great benefits that come with proper use of a projector.

I put these things forward for you thoughts. Please comment with your insights, thoughts and challenges.

Next week: #2 in the series on the Bad PowerPoint presentation.

This does reflect the thoughts and views of the author and the blog.

Rant: In general, I object to an implied superiority of one medium being superior to another. Each medium has its own strengths and weaknesses. Written word can provide a depth that movies can't. Movies can create vivid imagery that is impossible for a book to do. No matter how good your imagination is, you can't make it more clear than a movie can.

This nonsense resistance to eBooks is an affront to human progress. On the one hand we destroy our earth with waste and air pollution, then on the other hand we object to measures that could greatly decrease our waste.

Some object because they can't mark up eBooks, which is untrue. Most eReaders have note and highlighting functions. It is true that they are not as easy to use with physical books, but there is still note taking capability.

Then this is encouraged with the nonsense of citing electronic sources differently from their physical equivalents. If I go into archives of journals and pick an article, do I get different content than if I went onto the database and got it that way? I don't think so. Yet prejudice is created hindering progress over stupid things like that.

I get distracted by bad fonts and poor spacing. If a book is laid out in such a way, I can't get through it. With flowing eBook text, I can spoil my eyes. Nice big fonts, even though I don't need glasses, why strain? I get my favorite font, Georgia, the one I use on this blog. Nice big spacing so my eyes don't jump from line to line. Nothing could be better.

end rant

 

Facebook Fellowship & Pastoral Care

I have seen a great many poorly done church Facebook pages. I have also seen a lot of good ones. This article is about the good ones. I am going to do a single case study on how my home church uses Facebook successfully, but I'd love to hear and republish stories about churches who also have really good presence in social media.

St. Matthews Lutheran Church in North Hollywood is my home congregation, so I may be a biased. However, they have created some good practices to assist Pastoral Care and Fellowship through Facebook.

People not Places

Its called Facebook, not Place book. A Church Facebook page with your sanctuary as a profile picture might be a good idea, but that shouldn't be your entire presence on Facebook. St. Matthews has that Church page but the Pastor also has a Facebook. Moreover, Susan Wolfe the Pastor has a Facebook.

Pastor Sue's Facebook isn't just a list of church events, or posts on how successful the fundraiser was, it is her, the person. It is not a daily bible verse feed, it is her, the person. If you take a look at her page you have a combination of personal reflections, things her life, news articles, and funny videos from the Colbert Report. You get the sense that the Pastor is a real person, not some holy sage spouting verses and reflections or a church bulletin board. She becomes a palatable person.

Since that Pastor is now a human that someone can relate to, parishioners and future parishioners can get under the first layer that a visitor normally experiences. In this way the seeker is then seeing a community and simply a devotional manual or bulletin board.

The Pastor then uses the Facebook to share who they are, what thoughts are running through their heads, and most importantly how their church works in their life. A Ministerial presence on Facebook needs to be a face, not a church bulletin board or devotional manual. People need to be able to relate to the community, and by these relations they learn about Christ and the church.

So then the posts of a Pastor could look something like a mix of bible verses, funny YouTube videos, actual Facebook interaction with parishioners, and yes, maybe an update or two about how bingo night went. One might also want to make their posts something that people  are invited to comment on.

However, if its just this Pastor going on about church, the bible, their social life, or that video of a cat playing a Piano, that may be kind of weird and sad. We all know that churches are more than their pastor, they have a lot of other important people in them. So what do we do?

Facebook Ministry Team

Pastor Sue has recruited a number of People from the congregation to be a part of a Facebook ministry team. This team will do a number of various duties: add visitors on Facebook, check up on parishioners who haven't attended in a while, tout recent church events, interact with the Pastor's Facebook, but most importantly they are just average people on Facebook.

A lot of the same theory that goes behind the "Pastor's Facebook" but that this includes parishioners and helps create an online sense of congregational community. They help the Pastor in his or her ministry on Facebook by giving someone to talk and interact with, to show how the church has a real presence (no pun intended) on Facebook. It isn't just a Pastor posting stuff, instead its a Pastor and the community joining in online fellowship. They become just like any other circle of people who have Facebook.

On the other side of things, This gives people who may not be able to volunteer a lot during the week a way to participate in the church's ministry in a flexible way. It is a way to help your community feel involved in the community. Its easy to do, it requires no real technical skill.

Consider too, having your leaders create a Facebook presence. The council president, the Youth director, the Sacristan etc, could all have a Facebook presence creating a sense of an online as well as real community.

Conclusion


In short, your object is to create a vision of a real community of real people in a virtual setting. You want to create a circle. This circle gives the seeker a way to see not only the events or theology, but the real people in the community. This circle however is an open circle that gives opportunities for people who may not be in the circle.

My theory about social media, telecommunication and the real world can be described as circles. The reason people, especially teens, love social media is because it gives them a way to be constantly in contact with the circles to which they belong. So the reason a teenager may seem distant at an adult party, a cousins wedding, and even church, is because they want to be with what is comfortable and what they know. Then as a way to escape from what is uncomfortable to what is comfortable.

Your goal then is to find a way to attract the seeker and help them make this new circle their own. The miracle of the information age is it allows people to remain in contact with their circles at an unprecedented level. So therefore you need to create a new circle that people to which people want to belong. Not simply a site for updates about church events or a list of bible verses, but a community, a circle to which one wants to sit in.