Slashdot Mirror
Technology For the Masses: Churches Going Hi-Tech
theodp writes "More and more, reports the Chicago Tribune, churches are embracing the use of tablets and smartphones during services. At Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's South Side, the Rev. Otis Moss III preaches from his iPad. 'There was a time in the church when the Gutenberg Bible was introduced,' notes early adopter Moss. 'There was a severe concern among ministers who were afraid the printed page would be such a distraction if you put it in the hands of people in worship.' Tech-savvy churchgoers are also on board. 'In the service, when they say to pull out Bibles, I pull that phone out,' Ted Allen Miller said of using his Android smartphone at Willow Creek Community Church."
Maybe we're all just really high tech, but my pastor has been using his laptop in services for ten or fifteen years. Rather than carrying a Bible and notepad, many of us in the congregation have been using laptops with Bible software for following along and note taking. One of the first things my wife did when she won an iPad was to get a Bible program and set up her note-taking system with it. Somehow I'm able to avoid the urge to check my email; I think in part because I have a close network of friends who won't hesitate to call me out if I'm goofing off.
Carrying a digital Bible has many advantages; quickly changing to another reference, access to different versions, cross referencing and Strongs lookups...I'd have trouble going back to paper.
The iPad and such might make it easier (especially when it comes to the really big books, as it definitely saves bulk in many cases), but I do have one nitpick with the summary...
re: " 'There was a severe concern among ministers who were afraid the printed page would be such a distraction if you put it in the hands of people in worship."
Err, the vast majority of a given population back then couldn't read, so on what rational basis would that concern be placed?
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Even the extremely conservative Roman Catholic Church officially recognises evolution. Here in Europe most people never heard about the Creationism stupidity in their lives. Only in the USA and a few Muslim countries you can find batshit religious fanatics trying to push that shit around, and being taken seriously.
The primary concern the clergy had with the laity having Bible's in their own language was that they might actually read it and compare what it said to what was being taught from the pulpit. Christianity has had almost 2000 years of significant forks - its history is rife with individuals trying to make their church more popular by blending in local non christian concepts, softening the tone of unpopular language, and removing or changing phrases that might offend. My favorite data point - God's name appears almost 7000 times in the original texts, yet most modern translations have dropped that to between three and zero! Why? Because 'its tradition not to use it', and 'it might confuse people who should believe that Jesus is God', which is hard to make people accept if the Bible is left in its original state as referring to Jesus as the Son of an Almighty God with a different name that most Christians have been told they should not even pronounce.
The power of the clergy came from them telling the people that the Bible was best left in Latin, they should believe what they were told, and follow what the King said. Their telling people to obey the King kept their comfortable relationship with the ruling classes. For a long time anyone in possession of a Bible in English would be executed, most often because they quickly realized the Trinity was a false teaching. For example, the last person officially burnt alive for this in England was a medical student in 1612.
Fun quote: "Canon 14. We prohibit also that the laity should not be permitted to have the books of the Old or New Testament; we most strictly forbid their having
any translation of these books." - The Church Council of Toulouse 1229 AD
Your comment about modern translations is also confused. The Jews have a taboo on the pronunciation of the Name in Hebrew. This is why Jews may cheerfully say "God forbid" or "from your mouth to God's ears" - the word "God" in English isn't forbidden. (and I wouldn't directly print even a transliteration of the name on Slashdot, despite being an agnostic.) The nonexistent word "Jehovah" arises precisely because pointed versions of Torah used to point the name with the vowels of Adonai to remind the reader to substitute Adonai instead, and insufficiently educated Christians thought that it was a real word.
The real problem with the laity reading the Bible without sufficient education turned out to be entirely justified. The fear was that, through lack of scholarship, they wouldn't understand what they were reading, and would start up deviant sects. The existence of the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons, which began in exactly such a way, makes the point. The really weird thing to my mind is the fundamentalist Evangelicals who combine the non-Biblical overemphasis on Jesus to which you (in my view correctly) allude, with a ridiculous misunderstanding of the way to understand Genesis.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
It's also pretty old news. Preachers have been broadcasting sermons and hymns on TV for decades, on radio before that. What church doesn't list a phone number?
Is there still a church that lacks an internet presence? Even the tiny, poor church I attended (in the poorest neighborhood in town) over five years ago had the computerized large screen. The one I attend now is very large, rich, high-tech church, with two giant screens, professional stage lighting, electric musical instruments, all computerized. Flat screens all over the concourse.
You're right, churches (except perhaps the Amish) have embraced technology before I was born, and that was a LONG time ago.
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