Using Technology to Modernise Worship

Naomi4Christ said:

It is funny that when we have catholic mass in school, I am somehow compelled to look away when priest is doing his bit. I must be subconsciously worried about gazing at the sacrament when it is raised in error.

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sigh

seeking_perfection said:

I wouldn't call the Eucharist 'not a major thing'. Last time I checked, it was a major part of Common Worship. What exactly would you be doing other than watching the priest intently when the Eucharistic Prayer takes place? (Surely not the screen ).

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Maybe contemplating the event we are participating in and its significance.

Lets remember (a) that its entirely in keeping with Cranmer's legacy to view the contemplation on our justification by faith as the central act of the eucharist and (b) in the Eastern Church the whole eucharistic action is hidden behind the iconostasis.

ebia said:

Maybe contemplating the event we are participating in and its significance.

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Or praying.

higgs2 said:

Or praying.

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Or looking around to see if someone has remembered to call the Sunday School back in...

ebia said:

Maybe contemplating the event we are participating in and its significance.

Lets remember (a) that its entirely in keeping with Cranmer's legacy to view the contemplation on our justification by faith as the central act of the eucharist and (b) in the Eastern Church the whole eucharistic action is hidden behind the iconostasis.

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i have no problem with not watching because one is in prayer - having a big screen showing me the words of the prayer of consecration is something else. I'd rather they not be looking at the text in a book either, but at least that is not bothering others.

As for the Orthodox, I think there would be a major incident if someone tried to use a big screen or PowerPoint during the DL. They don't even seem to use texts a lot of the time.

In any case, isn't that why so many modern worshipers want the priest facing the congregation and the altar down in the congregation so they can look at what is going on and feel part of the action?

MKJ said:

i have no problem with not watching because one is in prayer - having a big screen showing me the words of the prayer of consecration is something else. I'd rather they not be looking at the text in a book either, but at least that is not bothering others.

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You're no more obliged to look at the screen than you are at a book. Having adjusted to having a screen I find it less distracting than people looking through books, not more. And its hugely more accessable for those who haven't grown up in the church.

As for the Orthodox, I think there would be a major incident if someone tried to use a big screen or PowerPoint during the DL.

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That's not relevant to the response I was making and I'm sure you know it.

The peripherals to how we work the liturgy have always adapted to use fresh technology and always will. And there is nothing wrong with that unless one is more interested in making time stand still than in what the liturgy encompases - God incarnate in our time.

And whereas in this our time, the minds of men are so diverse, that some think it a great matter of conscience to depart from a piece of the least of their Ceremonies, they be so addicted to their old customs; and again on the other side, some be so newfangled, that they would innovate all things, and so despise the old, that nothing can like them, but that is new: it was thought expedient, not so much to have respect how to please and satisfy either of these parties, as how to please God, and profit them both.


Some things never change.

ebia said:

Or looking around to see if someone has remembered to call the Sunday School back in...

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do you go to my church?

Sometimes it's nice to know that some problems are universal. We have children's chapel in a separate building and can see the service remotely on a monitor. But sometimes it doesn't work and then it's a matter of guessing...

MKJ said:

...

In any case, isn't that why so many modern worshipers want the priest facing the congregation and the altar down in the congregation so they can look at what is going on and feel part of the action?

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Actually, it's not just because it's what worshippers want, it is a major theological change and is in the rubrics of the TEC BCP.

ebia said:

And whereas in this our time, the minds of men are so diverse, that some think it a great matter of conscience to depart from a piece of the least of their Ceremonies, they be so addicted to their old customs; and again on the other side, some be so newfangled, that they would innovate all things, and so despise the old, that nothing can like them, but that is new: it was thought expedient, not so much to have respect how to please and satisfy either of these parties, as how to please God, and profit them both.

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Who is this quote from? I'm hoping it's Thomas Cranmer. it's a great quote.

seeking_perfection said:

I wouldn't call the Eucharist 'not a major thing'. Last time I checked, it was a major part of Common Worship. What exactly would you be doing other than watching the priest intently when the Eucharistic Prayer takes place? (Surely not the screen ).

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I said that staring at the presbyter was not a major thing.

higgs2 said:

Who is this quote from? I'm hoping it's Thomas Cranmer. it's a great quote.

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I believe it's Cranmer - it's from the 1662.

seeking_perfection said:

Apologies, I slightly misread your post. However, I still don't really get the 'compelled to look away' comment.

Anyway, I am straying off topic so...

I don't think I've yet heard of a 'High church' setting in which screens and the most modern stuff has been embraced. Does anyone have any examples (with pictures if possible) to show?

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Counting what as high church?

ebia said:

That's not relevant to the response I was making and I'm sure you know it.

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Yes and no. It isn't to the point that one doesn't, in the eastern or the older Western tradition, need really to have that visibly of the altar that seems important to people these days in many cases.

But OTOH I really am not a fan of bringing in one aspect of the Eastern or ancient practice while ignoring others, which seems to happen all to often. These are not a series of discrete unrelated items - they represent a particular understanding of the liturgy.

Yes, in the East they do not typically see the altar, and often do not hear the priest all that well. They also don''t have a screen, or a text, and may be doing very much their own thing during the liturgy. they do not have this idea that they need to be participating in the liturgy in the same way modern Anglicans often seem to - although they are undoubtedly participating in another sense.

The reason that even an open minded Orthodox Christian would object to a big screen is that it is simply not in line with the way they understand we are to relate to or experience the liturgy. So it seems very strange to bring in something from that tradition - the iconostasis - which is diametrically opposed to the kind of accesibility and participation where people have things to do during the liturgy. You are taking a particular of Eastern practise to support an Anglican practise which is actually opposed to the whole Eastern focus.

The peripherals to how we work the liturgy have always adapted to use fresh technology and always will. And there is nothing wrong with that unless one is more interested in making time stand still than in what the liturgy encompases - God incarnate in our time.

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I don't disagree in the sense that technology has always changed, and that is not a problem per se. Technology is fine if it is in accord with the purposes of the liturgy. I like the furnace. I like electric lights. I think amplification has had mixed results generally. I don't like big screens in church. I think they encourage a kind of text based approach that is not particularly desirable. I can think of cases where they might be helpful, but on balance I think they are more likely to be negative. I tend to think that people make accessibility too much of a focus - it has a place, which is often over-emphasized (and sometimes under-emphasized.) I think Scripture and the text of the liturgy are meant to be essentially aural, and oral, and the liturgy accounts for the visual in other ways.

I am not totally in agreement that the liturgy is about making God incarnate in our time. That is true, but only partly, and it is our natural inclination to think that way. We almost always see things through our own experience. But the Eucharist is just as much about taking us out of time - we participate alongside not only the man in the next pew, but also the woman who sat there in a previous century, and the early Christians hiding in the catacombs, and the family worshiping three hundred years in the future, and the angels and saints worshiping endlessly in heaven. So it is as much about taking us out of time, so that when we come back and go out into the world, we have brought God with us.

As humans we are in a special place - unlike the angels, we can see things in their particularity and individuality in space and time. That is a part of our animal nature. But unlike animals, we can also see things in their relation to eternity and God. But that is almost always harder for us, and that is a big part of why we have the Eucharist, and why we need to set aside time for daily prayer.

Most people find it easy to relate to their own time and place. Moving beyond that to place ourselves in eternity is more difficult, and one of the ways we can accomplish that is by paying attention to making the liturgy as timeless as we can.

to do during the liturgy. You are taking a particular of Eastern practise to support an Anglican practise which is actually opposed to the whole Eastern focus.

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I was simply responding to the question about what else one might be doing than looking at the table - a question that was tangential in the first place.

It seems to me your idea of timeless is not timeless at all, but is simply particular times given precedence above all others.
But I also disagree with your basic premise - that screens make the congregation more text based than books. My experience is, if anything, the opposite.

As far as accessibility goes, that simply is not an option in our context, not I think, in a wider church that has failed dismally at mission for about a century

The big technological change that made us text based was the printing press, not the data-projector. You're half a millennium too late to shut that stable door.

I'm in the process of helping my church modernise it's setup and I can see both sides of the argument. My approach has been fairly basic: technology is there to assist the church's worship. I know of one church where the only place the screen can go is dead-centre above the crossing - slightly unfortunate! We're lucky in that we can put it to one side.