Liturgy 38.4: Market Dynamics and Worship Technologies

Issue 38.4 of Liturgy is entitled “Market Dynamics and Worship Technologies” and is guest-edited by Nicholas Zork. What follows is Zork’s introduction to the issue.

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Liturgical practices are developed and embodied within a complex, dynamic liturgical ecology. The axiom, lex orandi, lex credendi—"the law of prayer [is] the law of faith”—is often expanded to include lex vivendi: as we worship, so we believe, and so we live. The articles in this issue consider a more specific set of factors within the broad category of lex vivendi (“how we live”) in that contributors explore how the business and marketing of worship, and specifically worship technology, both respond to and shape worship practices and worshipers. For this reason, it is worth considering a further adaptation of Prosper of Aquitaine’s dictum: lex vendendi, lex orandi, lex credendi—the way we worship and what we believe are also influenced by what we are being sold. Economic incentives are part of any liturgical ecology.

It is impossible to extricate worship from the broader culture and marketplace. As multiple contributors point out, the technology we adopt and adapt for Christian worship is not semantically neutral. We are all familiar with Marshall McLuhan’s maxim, “the medium is the message.” It is well known in the media, event, and worship industrial complexes that the medium is also monetizable. Consequently, liturgical leaders must navigate a cultural environment incentivized to promote the acquisition of new worship technologies, which may or may not effectively serve the mission of their church communities.

The factors that drive integrating emerging technologies into liturgical practice are varied and can even be unprecedented. Heidi A. Campbell and Sophia Osteen examine, for example, both how the Covid-19 pandemic necessitated rapid technological adaptation and “some of the most common ways congregations were forced to change or rethink the liturgical elements of their services during the Covid-19 pandemic as they transitioned to online services.”

Jonathan Powers reflects on the Asbury Outpouring and the “attentiveness to and expectancy of God’s presence” that he witnessed. One wonders how social media, so often viewed as a source of distraction—liturgical and otherwise—had the opposite liturgical effect during the Asbury Outpouring. Considering the recent rapid rollout of artificial intelligence and related new media, Uday Mark Balasundaram asks us to consider “the inherent and potential nature of media technology as something that is more than purely transactional but, rather, transformational: new media as extensions of God in ways that we have yet to discover.”

Some technological advances and changes in market dynamics do not so much raise new liturgical questions as they change the way liturgical leaders approach answering longstanding questions such as what music we choose to sing together in worship and why. Joshua Kalin Busman and Deborah Wong, as well as Adam Perez et al., investigate the intertwined, complex, changing relationship between the music industry and worship music practices—both with local churches and as part of what Busman and Wong call participation in “a particular translocal worship experience.” One might think that the amount of worship music available online would increase the diversity of liturgical expression, but as Perez et al. point out, current worship music business practices are such that “a small number of individuals and groups have an outsized role in shaping the song repertory of the twenty-first-century church.”

As Joseph Roso’s article notes, even relatively ubiquitous technology such as “streaming and recording infrastructure were not distributed equally across congregations.” And importantly, “for many congregations, adopting a particular worship technology is not a question of ‘keeping up’ so much as a question of whether or not that new technology would advance the congregation’s mission." Chris Reed and Todd Stout discuss the practical implications of ensuring that vision and mission drive the purchase and implementation of new A/V and communication technology. Reed discusses ways to clarify the vision and unique ministry needs in advance, helping a congregation avoid the unfortunate, common scenario where churches “buy three sound systems before arriving at a proper solution.” For Stout, this strategy has meant insisting on the need for clarity around the goal “not simply to communicate with more people but to cultivate a particular type of Gospel-centered and liturgically formed community.”

Trade publications and trade shows provide further windows into the relationship between worship, technology, and market dynamics. Brian Blackmore offers insights from his decades-long experience as editor of Church Production Magazine. Victoria Larson and Lester Ruth reflect on their recent visit to the Church Facility Expo trade show, observing that “the technology used in worship usually has not been developed just for liturgical purposes, and the companies marketing this technology are not selling it solely for use in sanctuaries.” This reality increases the potential for incongruence between market incentives, the intrinsic significance of any medium or technology, and the intended liturgical function of its appropriation. The technology we buy and use does not only communicate a message but shapes participants. As Larson and Ruth assert, for example, “It is not only that humans produce television, but television itself is producing a certain kind of humanity.”

The primary outcome of worship production, then, is not merely an event but a transformed worshiper. Careful attention to all dimensions of a liturgical ecology, including market dynamics and worship technology, is necessary to ensure our worship practices faithfully embody and rehearse our deepest values.