Muting the Voices of the Body: Music, Technology and Ministry, Once Again

Some telling lessons for contemporary debates about the role of technology in contemporary Christian worship, especially those technologies that organize our collective singing of praises.

God is Not Spectacular

Communication technologies are not neutral channels. Just as the riverbed shapes the path of the river as much as the river does, so too, society’s media shape their organization as much as they do. To take an example, smartphones may ostensibly “connect” us, but everyone knows that what they have actually done is atomize us […]

When the Made Remakes the Maker: Theology and Technoculture

Waters, Brent (2014). Christian Moral Theology in the Emerging Technoculture: From Posthuman Back to Human. Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate (260 pages). This piece originally appeared on Marginalia on February 17, 2015. Brent Waters’s Christian Moral Theology in the Emerging Technoculture: From Posthuman to Technoculture extends inquiries pursued over the last fifteen years into the question of what it […]

The Imminent Decline of Contemporary Worship Music: Eight Reasons

By imminent decline of contemporary worship music, I do not mean imminent disappearance. Commercial forces have too substantial an interest to permit contemporary worship music to disappear entirely; and human beings are creatures of habit who do not adapt to change quickly. I do not predict, therefore, a disappearance of contemporary worship music, sooner or later. […]

The Word Without Flesh: An Ethical Evaluation of Digital Media in Multi-Site Worship

It is not news to anyone that digital media use is a prominent characteristic of 21st century living. It is also not news to anyone that the American church is regrettably quick to fall in line with cultural whims (being all things to all people while remaining in the world but not of it is […]

Are TED Talks the New Sermon?

The digital age is invading our society like the army of locusts in Joel’s ambiguous prophecy (Joel 2:1-17). We have been ushered into a world of bits, bytes, data, and meta-data. Our interpersonal interactions are changing, our businesses are changing, and even the wiring of our brain is changing (Carr, Jackson, Brynjolfsson). “Media is now […]

J. Ellsworth Kalas’ “Preaching in an Age of Distraction”: A Review

Preaching in an Age of Distraction, by J. Ellsworth Kalas. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2014. 165 pages. As the title and the chapter on “Naming the Age” indicate, Ellsworth Kalas, who teaches homiletics at Asbury Seminary, regards ours as an age characterized by distraction.  Somewhat surprisingly, however, he is eager to indicate that distraction is not new: […]

Online Communion for United Methodists?

Last week, Leroy Huizenga (@LHuizenga) sent us a link to an article on the United Methodist Church’s website titled, “Should churches offer Holy Communion online?” The article notes that this is one of the questions that was to be tackled by a group of UM bishops, theologians, and pastors sponsored by the UM Board of […]

‘Is It Ok to Use iPads in Church?’ Asks Catholic Diocese in Survey

The Catholic Diocese of Wichita, KS just sent out a survey to Catholic faithful asking what people thought about iPads being used in Mass. There’s also been a discussion over at the Gospel Coalition on the same subject. What do you think? Do tablet computers have a place in Christian worship?

Looking Back Upon the Era of YouTube

By this means, they tried to make themselves immortal, the scroll of their days and silly jokes unrolling digitally, the flickering video rolling ever onward tirelessly recording, continuously on as they uploaded incessantly, clicking on phone or tablet, as if to make penny offerings to the great god they had raised to make themselves laugh. […]

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