Church as Screen Time and Pastor as Parasocial Personality

Just a quick riff on a couple of news items coming out this week:

• First, the introduction of the hologram pastor.
• Second, research published in Pediatrics suggests that childhood obesity in pre-school age children is directly linked to dislocated familial attachments facilitated by too much time in front of the television and too few communal meals with the family.
• Third, a second unrelated research project coming out of New Zealand suggests much of the same conclusions with regard to teenagers. Teens with more “screen time” have significantly lower attachment to their parents and peers (HT: Kara Powell).

There’s a fascinating sentence in the last summary:

“However, it is also possible that adolescents with poor attachment relationships with immediate friends and family use screen-based activities to facilitate new attachment figures such as online friendships or parasocial relationships with television characters or personalities,” the authors write.

I’ve written about this before, calling it the “mediation of experience.” If “screen time” inhibits our social interactions and relational attachments by replacing the real thing with “parasocial relationships” with unreal characters can the same be said to be true of other instances where we replace real live relationships with unreal characters or personalities?

Obviously I think the answer is yes.

One of the problems with the prevailing mode of church in America is that it has turned the pastor into a celebrity personality, complete with a performance-oriented and technologically mediated relationship with an audience. Once the church reaches a certain size, the pastor’s interaction must occur as a performance by a character through media. Cultural expectations about church structure coupled with assumptions about the virtues of media nearly require this. The trouble is, the character that pastor portrays, in my experience, in never quite the real thing. Some pastors try very hard to “be themselves” on stage, but others intentionally slip into a very different persona. But even for the pastor trying to be genuine, it’s very difficult in my opinion – perhaps impossible – to avoid some level of acting when you’re a preacher on stage, largely because of the entertainment-based expectations we currently impose upon the notion of what it means to be a “good preacher.”

One of the bizarre side-effects of this mediated relationship between the pastor and congregation is that, because of the high level of mediated exposure to the preacher, many in the church (most, in the case of very large churches),  actually feel a personal connection to the pastor that doesn’t actually exist. They don’t really know the pastor, in much the same way they don’t really know Oprah or Dr. Phil. They only know your stage persona. This is greatly magnified in those churches who embrace the personality-driven church model and use a charismatic pastor’s performance skills as a means of growing the church.

Hence, the church gathering becomes just another version of “screen time.”

Now consider how “screen time” becomes literally true in the proliferation of video venue churches, where many congregations only interact with a version of the pastor that is literally unreal. Now replace the video screen with hologram which remains unreal, but magnifies the level of illusion.

Moreover, much like the teens in the second study cited above who talk to each other about the fictional characters they’ve mutually engaged as relational surrogates, church members will often interact around the pastor’s persona. In this way a false persona can become a means of false social relationships. This is akin to kids talking enthusiastically about what “happened” to Hanna Montana in the latest episode (nothing happened…she doesn’t exist!). In celebrity-driven churches much of the social energy occurs around the campfire of a false persona.

Does it matter? Is there harm being done by moving church toward just another version of “screen time?” What are the consequences of this to discipleship? Perhaps, like the studies above, the consequences are spiritually obese, socially disconnected and disaffected Christians.

Technorati Tags: Church, discipleship, Media, Mega-Churches, Pastors, Teenagers

Book: Tending To Eden by Scott Sabin

There has been a fair amount of activity in recent years around a Christian posture toward environmentalism, but few people I know in the church have a genuinely holistic understanding of how the degradation of environmental resources contributes to severe poverty like Scot Sabin, and few organizations are working to address those holistic problems as effectively as Plant With Purpose, the San Diego-based non-profit that Scott directs.

Scott has a new book out on the subject called Tending To Eden. I was fortunate to receive an advanced copy, and lest you think it’s just another Christian gloss on planting trees and recycling waste, think again. Here’s an excerpt:

***

Most of us long to be part of something bigger than ourselves. Our consumer-oriented culture has done a miserable job of giving us any sense of purpose. Yet mainstream Christianity has often failed to provide an alternative.

Fresh off my summer in Guatemala, and on the heels of the Los Angeles riots, I asked a pastor what he saw as the biggest challenge facing the church. I yearned to hear how Christians might confront racism and injustice. Instead, he responded with concern over the church’s upcoming fundraising campaign to raise money for its new office building.

To be fair, the pastor had misinterpreted the question. But my sense of betrayal was compounded when I saw the campaign, crafted around the idea that “people without a vision perish.” Expensive banners called the congregation to be “Faithful to the Vision.” It was effective fundraising, but the scale of the vision made a mockery of the Kingdom of God.

The body of Christ is the only hope for a hurting and unjust world. God help us when our biggest visions are limited to building campaigns.

The message of the church has often been that what we do in this life doesn’t really matter as long as we avoid certain since such as drinking,  swearing, and fornicating. God has already won the battle, and we just have to stay out of trouble until Jesus returns to take us away.

But the Christian life isn’t only about what not to do. We have a role in bringing the justice, hope, and peace of Christ to the world. God has given us an active role in the grand story of the redemption of the universe. How many people outside the Church would be drawn in if they saw us bringing justice, hope, and peace?

I am heartened by the renewed interest in social justice I see within the church, especially among youth. Today I meet twenty-three-year-old college students at the same point in their vocational development I reached at age thirty-two. Social justice is now fashionable. I hope it is more than merely a fad.

***

If you care about alleviating poverty and tackling ecological challenges then Tending To Eden is a must read. Also, if you’re ready to get your hands dirty, get in touch with Plant With Purpose. They have amazing opportunities to partner with them in their mission to restore broken communities around the globe.

Technorati Tags: Books, Christianity, Plant With Purpose, Scott Sabin, Tending To Eden

Mark Driscoll Gets Lost in Translation

Mark Driscoll recently ranted about the movie Avatar, calling it the most “Satanic” movie he’s ever seen, and doesn’t understand how any Christian could watch it and not absolutely condemn it. Well…I’m a Christian and I liked the movie (I know it’s fashionable to hate on Avatar these days, but I was thoroughly entertained. No, it wasn’t fine cinema, but is that really what you expected from James Cameron?). It also contains some fascinating commentary on our culture and the deep spiritual longings of humanity, all of which are relevant to Christianity and not all of which are opposed to Christianity.

This reminded me of an old post I wrote last year (on an old blog) while I was at The Sundance Film Festival. So, first Mark’s 3-minute rant (if you care to watch it), then my old post below:

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Sundance/Windrider Day 3: Lost in Translation (January 22, 2009)

I’m three days into my time here at The Sundance Film Festival and it’s been amazing. I’ve seen 10 movies so far – 4 shorts and 6 features, plus Q&A sessions with directors and cast members after every film – and I’ve noticed a few surprising things about the culture of film on display here.

There are some amazing artists who are asking important questions about life, and telling incredibly compelling stories of suffering, loss, hardship, redemption, love, joy, and spirituality. Again and again, the common ground that exists between the filmmaker’s values and the values of the biblical narrative have taken me by surprise. There is very little ambiguity in the depictions I’ve seen of yearning for love and security, or the necessity of risking one’s life in order to find it, or the desperate need for justice in situations of appalling human suffering and depravity.

Through cinema, the world is shouting for the things of God. Sadly, as far as the church is concerned, they’re using the wrong language.

Most of these directors and producers are completely secular. I don’t necessarily mean they’re ireligious – many aren’t – but their worldview, and the vernacular utilized to convey their art is utterly unfamiliar to the Christian subculture. I think this makes for a distance between these two groups that is more perceived than actual.

Tonight after the screening of Sin Nombre (an intensely powerful and disturbing film about illegal immigration) an audience member from our group asked the director whether he’d intended to depict contrasting images of “conditional vs. unconditional love” in his portrayal of two specific relationships, one involving mercy, the other betrayal.

It was a good question. The story delved deeply into the complexities of acceptance, rejection, trust, loyalty, and faithfulness between the characters.

Still, the director balked. In a very polite way he basically said he didn’t know what to do with the phrase “unconditional love,” and preferred to think of those character dynamics in terms of “families in flux,” forming on the one hand, and dissolving on the other.

In other words, his answer was “yes.” He absolutely intended (among other things) to depict broken covenant loyalties on the one hand, and faithful covenant loyalties on the other.

The problem, I think, is language itself. “Unconditional love” is conservative evangelical church vernacular for the kind of love that is most valuable or virtuous (and only comes from God). It’s a staple teaching point in most evangelical youth groups. But in my experience secular people rarely ever use that phrase, even if they might be talking about the same spirit.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen or heard this sort of thing in the last few days, either in the films themselves or the Q&A sessions. God is profoundly at work through many of these films, but he’s usually disguised in a culture and a language that is entirely foreign (and often frightening) to prevailing Christianity.

If we want to be conversant with the culture we find ourselves in we’re going to have to go out of our way to learn the language by listening deeply, patiently, and charitably. Once we do, we may indeed find that these powerful cultural prophets only want the things of God, but not God himself. However, we may discover that, at least for some, they were never rejecting God, only what we said and what they heard.

Technorati Tags: art, Avatar, Christianity, Culture, Film, Mark Driscoll

Monday Morning Poetry: I Hear America Singing by Walt Whitman

I Hear America Singing

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deck-hand
singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as
he stands,
The woodcutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the morn-ing, or at
noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work,or
of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,
The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows,
robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

Technorati Tags: Poetry, Walt Whitman

Mumford and Sons on Letterman

So, last week I met a new friend in Houston named James. He gave me a bit of hell in the Q&A portion of my panel for “unfairly picking on Martin Luther” in my paper concerning the development of the autonomous self through the theological validation of usury, and wanted to know if I didn’t think Luther’s contributions in that way couldn’t be seen as part of the Hegelian notion of progress. I said “no” – I think Luther just caved to pressure from his new patrons, the emerging German princes.

Anyway, I came to know James a bit better later on and found out that not only is he brighter than me, he’s incredibly talented as well (he’s currently writing a screenplay) and he’s royalty. Sort of. His mum and dad (John and Eleanor Mumford) are legends in the Vineyard and the heads of the Vineyard Association in the U.K.

Well, apparently, they’re an unbelievably talented family, because his brother Marcus heads up a band – Mumford and Sons – that made their American network debut last night on Letterman. Check em out:

Technorati Tags: Letterman, Mumford and Sons, Mumfords, Music