Many and Small
We’re in a new cycle now in the H.O.W. universe, one where many and small is the paradigm, replacing few and huge. The so-called satellite church has become the new model, and it’s one that will be making technology manufacturers and operators very happy regardless of their personal beliefs.
The trend toward satellite churches goes back several years. An article in Christianity Today in 2005 identified the trend, pointing out, at the time, that “almost 1,000 U.S. churches” were embracing “a multi-site approach” (sometimes called a “satellite” or “franchise” model) which advocates are calling “one of the leading innovations of the 21st century.”
The trend toward satellite churches also serves as a practical response to the need for outreach, bringing the religious message closer to where more people live — rather than attempting to draw from a larger geographic distance with the megachurch model. If there is a clear trend toward small and many, however, megachurches have made their mark, elevating expectations for the latest technologies to play a role in the worship experience — and technology remains a critical factor in making the satellite church concept work, too.
“Churches have an hour a week to make an impact on someone’s life, and they need technology to accomplish that,” observes Gary Zandstra, who oversees H.O.W. business development for Parkway Electric in Holland MI and who’s been one of my go-to sources for the H.O.W. tech sector for decades.
“Immersive” Telepresence
The most influential bit of technology that’s made satellite facilities successful has been life-size projection of pastors and teachers from central locations to outlying churches, what’s come to be called “environmental worship,” though Zandstra says the telepresence term “immersive” is more apt. Using a combination of multiple projectors to reproduce the same backgrounds in satellite churches that are found in the home church, then projecting a life-sized image of the pastor in real time via video over IP, the satellite church model is using a technological trompe l’oeil to establish connectivity that’s as emotionally solid as it is electronically reliable. Key platforms for accomplishing this include ProPresenter software, which was developed specifically for H.O.W. applications, and control hardware like Apple Mac Minis, which have become a favorite of AV integrators and are in some cases supplanting more conventional proprietary control systems.
Some larger churches now have as many as a dozen satellite campuses, and others are following suit. The implications for projection, lighting and staging technology are clear. More locations means that churches need to buy more systems and, just as importantly, they will need design, installation and operational expertise to get those systems started and keep them running.
One of the keys to successful immersiveness is to avoid any distraction that reminds attendees that what they are watching is, essentially, an illusion. The better the illusion, the more effective the message, and that equation will translate into more equipment sales and more hiring of expertise. Zandstra says he’s been installing as many as five screens and projectors per location, as churches seek to enhance their level of immersiveness, as well as more lighting to illuminate and mimic the secondary stages for music in each location.
VOIP
“Video is at the core of all of this, which is why we’re also seeing more video-over-IP, so that churches can create private networks for all of the locations that guarantee the bandwidth they’ll need,” he says. The screens are still fairly large ones and the projectors are HD more often than not, again to support the strategy of immersiveness or, put another way, the suspension of disbelief, the same voluntary psychological exercise we agree to participate in when we go to the movies.
The large central house of worship, even the megachurch itself, is still a viable approach for the H.O.W. market, though we may see fewer new ones of the largest variety. Zandstra says that people are tiring of sitting with 5,000 other worshipers and seem to prefer being with more like 500 or so at a time, as they search for more authenticity in both the message and the environment they’re hearing it in. An upcoming trend to watch for will be the integration of social media content into services via projection video, which is also a development that meshes well with smaller, more intimate congregation sizes.
Satellite churches mean more locations and more redundant equipment per location. That’s going to be a boon to staging, lighting and projection specialists who cater to the H.O.W. market which, despite some blows it sustained during the Great Recession, continues to be a robust market for AV technology. Perhaps because, like the movies, religion offers some welcome relief from day-to-day reality.
