ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, June 6, 1996 TAG: 9606060045
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: CHARLOTTTE, N.C.
SOURCE: JULIE SLAVEN KNIGHT-RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
Thirteen-year-old Jonathan Eckert used to dread going to his family's traditional Southern Baptist church. During Sunday service, he'd wander around the church hall with his friends or sit in the back and draw pictures.
But now that Jonathan's family attends Living Images Community Church - where a large screen displays videos and a band plays upbeat music - you can look for Jonathan in a different spot. He'll be in the front row, taking notes.
``The service here is more fun, more interesting,'' Jonathan says. ``This is a place where you can be who you want to be.''
Living Images is just one of a growing number of churches using technology, like large screens and advanced audiovisual equipment, to enhance worship services.
Ministers say they want to attract people who are disenchanted with traditional services.
``People plugging in are people who have had bad experiences with traditional churches or have written it off but are still seeking and trying to find some meaning in life,'' says David Motte, pastor of Living Images, which meets at McAlpine Elementary School in Charlotte.
For congregations like Forest Hill Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, using technology means projecting words on a large screen. For others, such as Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, it's a full-fledged effort: with sound effects and special lighting. Showing clips from movies to help illustrate a point has also become a popular practice.
Although only a small percentage of churches may be experimenting with technology, it's good news that some churches are getting out of their ``antique mentality,'' says Jacqulyn Weekley, director of nurturing ministries for the Western North Carolina conference of the United Methodist Church.
``Archaic terminology doesn't resonate with the younger generation because they've been brought up with technology,'' Weekley says. ``If the church doesn't use the language they're familiar with, then we're perceived as having no relevance in their lives.'' Some pastors hope that technologically enhanced services will make church attractive to young people, at a time when only 33 percent of adults under 30 attend services on a given Sunday, compared with 44 percent of older adults, according to a 1994 study by the Barna Research Group.
But critics, like the Rev. Joe Mulligan of St. Luke Catholic Church in Mint Hill, N.C., warn that too much entertainment can make a service ``gimmicky'' or turn it into a show - building barriers and creating a theatrical spectator experience.
``When you do a lot of lighting and people are kept in the dark ... you sit in splendid amazement rather than being pulled into the experience,'' he says. ``Priests aren't there to entertain; they're there to engage people in worship.''
Pastors at traditional churches may be trying to bring people into worship, but Doug Smith (who attends Mecklenburg Community Church) calls his former church boring. He says he and his kids would ``struggle to keep each other awake.''
But at Mecklenburg Community Church - which features a band and clips from ``City Slickers'' and ``The Money Pit'' - Smith says he is engaged and pulled into the service at David Cox Road Elementary School in Charlotte.
``You're using all your senses and the way it's all brought together ... the video clips and the music ... it's all climactic toward the message,'' Smith says.
But the Rev. Lewis Bledsoe, of Steele Creek Presbyterian, worries that using technology may result in a diluted message.
``I'd walk tiptoe through technology,'' Bledsoe says. ``It can call more attention to itself than to the message that's being projected.''
But pastors at high-tech churches say the message isn't changing. The Rev. Steve Huff of South Pointe Christian Church says it makes sense to use technology to deliver a message.
``Preachers are always saying, `I saw a movie once ...,' but with today's technology, you can actually show them the movie excerpt and bring a point home,'' he says.
Huff's church meets in a movie theater. Some recent feature presentations on the 25-foot screen at Arboretum 10 Cinemas include music videos, videotaped interviews with people about faith issues and clips from ``L.A. Story'' and ``Dead Poets Society.''
This is a welcome change for churchgoers who have been turned off to traditional ways of worship, Huff says.
What's turning them off? In a 1992 Barna survey of unchurched people in Charlotte, 36 percent said churches are usually boring. Another culprit? Messages that don't matter - 34 percent said church is irrelevant to their daily lives.
``We don't want boredom to be the stumbling block that keeps people from knowing God,'' Huff says.
Ken Schultz, associate pastor at Mecklenburg Community Church, says video clips help relate church to everyday life, so that people can say: ``Yeah, you folks are talking about my world.''
This is how Claudia Eckert felt when she saw clips from ``The Lion King'' and ``Disclosure'' at Living Images.
``I never thought of applying scripture or faith to some of these situations,'' she says.
Videos and other technology make messages interesting and relevant, so that people can ``take home what we're trying to get across,'' Huff says.
Consider Jonathan Eckert's experience at Living Images a testament to this.
Three Beatles songs (including ``Can't Buy Me Love'') and two movie clips (``Wall Street'' and ``Leap of Faith'') didn't water down the message for Jonathan. He still remembers the lesson now, more than two months after the service.
``It was about materialism,'' says Jonathan, a seventh-grader at Covenant Day School. ``All the money in the world isn't going to mean much when you die, because you can't take it with you to heaven.''
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