Currently, there are some 3,000 multi-sites in the country. Some churches that have adopted the one church in multiple locations approach have turned their other campuses into video venues. In other words, the pastor preaches at one location and is beamed to screens in other locations.
While the dust over beaming preachers on a video screen on multi-site campuses has somewhat settled, the new 3D tool is raising more questions and concerns among some believers.
“Since so many of us in the west are convinced that entertaining pew fodder is critical to advancing ‘the gospel’ and that only a very few have the necessary gifts to preachertain – this will become the ‘perfect’ solution,” Bill Kinnon, author of A Networked Conspiracy, Social Networks, The Church & the Power of Collective Intelligence, wrote in a recent blog post.
What has Kinnon and many other Christians talking is the holographic technology that music artist Madonna famously used at the Grammy Awards in 2006 and that one company wants to promote in churches.
Tony Morgan, pastor of ministries at West Ridge Church near Atlanta, introduced the technology as a possible church tool on his blog this week. He had visited with the company Clark (formerly Clark ProMedia) at their offices in Alpharetta, Ga., where they demonstrated the 3D tool. As he stood on the stage of the company’s new theater, an image of another person was projected next to him. From the audience’s perspective, it appears as if the other figure was actually present.
