wfn.org | Tex Sample Tells the Mainline to Learn from Electronic Culture

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13-September-1996 
 
 
 
96352        Tex Sample Tells the Mainline to Learn  
                     from Electronic Culture 
 
                          by Alexa Smith 
 
TOWSON, Md.--Theological ethicist and Southern raconteur Tex Sample is 
urging mainline denominations to consider finding new ways to express 
Christian faith in a culture that is increasingly electronic. 
 
     "The issue is not so much growth ... but witnessing and bringing 
people to Christ," United Methodist Sample told those who participated in 
his workshop at the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s "Small Church 
Celebration II." 
 
     His point is that congregations cannot witness to, touch or move 
people if they speak a language that their listeners do not understand or 
trust.  And this next generation is already deep into an electronic 
culture, where experiencing the convergence of image and sound matter most. 
 
     A Mississippi native and professor of church and society at the St. 
Paul School of Theology in Kansas City, Mo., Sample has carefully profiled 
how congregations hear and how clergy teach and preach -- and the 
unavoidable tension that occurs when church and community cultures ignore 
each other.  
 
     "Very often the small church -- and they are wonderful -- has one 
culture ... and the people around it have another one," said Sample, which 
means that congregations are often unable to connect, to "make the gospel 
take root." 
 
     Connecting, Sample said, isn't quite as hard as people think.  It 
simply means being sensitive to how people listen, hear and talk, to how 
they communicate.  And, he said, it doesn't necessarily cost more money to 
do. 
 
     Sample has defined what he calls both oral and literate culture: 
oral, where stories, relationships and proverbs, are the point; and 
literate, where theory and discourse illuminate the story to make the 
point.  But these days he's adding electronic culture to his repertoire, 
and he says the church -- even small churches -- need to be exploring how 
to do the same. 
 
     "We're in a far bigger switch now than when Luther began using the 
printing press," said Sample, adding that while the practices of the 
electronic culture are still forming, now is the time for churches to learn 
how to incorporate images and symbols more powerfully in worship. 
 
     Sample pushed his audience to think about more dramatic eucharistic 
services, where the chalice and loaf are lifted up and displayed instead of 
using the much less visual "little shot glasses" that have become so common 
in Protestant congregations.  He proposed using television monitors and 
liturgical drama to get images across more potently.  "We need to be making 
stuff as image-full as we can in worship. ... 
 
     "If people want a traditional service, dear God, keep it.  But add 
on," Sample said -- find ways to use a wide variety of sensory input. 
"Don't worry about having $180,000 worth of equipment. ... And don't be put 
off by being small.  That's no problem at all. 
 
     "If anything, it may be a real strength," Sample said, noting that 
many families and youth already own video and sound equipment and are well 
versed in how to use it. 
 
     Used sensitively, according to Sample, the practices of the electronic 
culture -- where spectacle and rhythmn, music and dance -- are not so far 
removed from the church's traditional practice.  "Give people permission to 
move ... stomping, snapping their fingers, slapping their thighs and 
clapping.  You can get most folks to do that," said Sample, adding that the 
rhythm of the liturgy is another way to move the congregation. 
 
     "Worship has a rhythm. ... The problem is we often start with a dirge 
and go down from there," he said, stressing how important it is -- in any 
good drama -- to mix humor and seriousness, lightness and depth.  "It makes 
an impact ... to keep the kind of pace that gets people right at the edge 
of laughter and right at the edge of tears," Sample suggested, adding that 
some caution needs to be used so as not to manipulate the congregation. 
 
     He said he's heard about congregations asking youth groups to create 
videos for use in worship and about others that are using rap to recite 
catechisms.  "We have to ask ourselves," Sample said, "where are those 
indigenous practices?  And how to use them? ... It's not reducing worship 
simply to entertainment.  But there are things about rhythm and pacing that 
we can really learn. 
 
     "It all has some resemblance to Pentecost," Sample told his audience. 
"And our birth says something ... about [experiencing] diverse cultures [to 
convey the gospel]." 

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