October 27, 1999
Media screen called
stained-glass of new era
___ADDISON--Designers of worship space for the 21st century should keep in mind they are creating church facilities for a postmodern, post-literate generation, according to author and minister Michael Slaughter.
___"Electronic media is the language of our culture," said Slaughter, pastor of Ginghamsburg United Methodist Church in Tipp City, Ohio. "Electronic media is to the reformation of the 21st century what Gutenberg's press was to the Reformation of the 16th century."
___Slaughter was a featured speaker at the 1999 Architects' Conference in Addison, sponsored by the church facilities department of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
___The postmodern generation is much more open to the mystery and awe of the spiritual than its rationalistic forebears, said Slaughter, author of "Spiritual Entrepreneurs" and "Out on the Edge."
___"Spirituality is in. We are in the middle of a huge God rush," he said, pointing to the spiritual hunger created within a generation that has lost faith in science and rationalism. "People believe in God, but they're not sure which god."
___The postmodern church will connect people to inspiration, it will be incarnational, it will value relationships and it will understand the power of metaphor, Slaughter said.
___Like the ancient cathedrals with their incense, candles and stained-glass windows that communicated to pre-literate people, the church of the 21st century must point to the mystery of the divine by involving all the senses of post-literate worshippers, he suggested. "The media screen is the stained-glass window of the postmodern age."
___But multi-sensory systems and structures need to serve the worship leaders' purpose of bringing people to Jesus, Slaughter added. "Multi-sensory worship should put the presenter on the two-yard line--so close you can trip and score."
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