killed preaching. Seemed odd at the time. Was it? According to the guy, if a preacher spoke without a microphone, he couldn’t simply mutter pious platitudes or speak in dull monotone without emotion or conviction. At least if he did, no one would be able to hear him. So, most likely, he would not simply babble on with words he had not prepared saying things without intention or passion. At least that is what this author said. The preacher would have to know what he wanted to say and how to say it -- without benefit of a microphone to amplify his speech. Without a microphone, the preacher would have to speak loudly and clearly in order to be heard. Without a microphone doing the bulk of the work of projection, the preacher might actually have to exert himself in the pulpit. Was he on to something or was this complainer simply searching for reasons in the all the wrong places?
The carbon microphone was first invented in the 1870s. The whole idea of a sound system (microphone + amplifier + loudspeaker) took longer -- sometime in the mid-1910s. Except for a very few, these contraptions were rarely installed in churches until the 1930s. Now you cannot go without them. I was once in a very small parish with a very small building but they still had microphones. People have to hear. Except they did hear long before microphones became standard equipment in churches. People heard preachers great and not so great. They heard them preach and not simply speak into microphones. Sure, they did have sounding boards and raised pulpits and pulpits located nearer the people to help them but the preaching was up to the preacher -- without benefit of sound amplification.
Have they helped preaching? We can certainly hear better but the question of whether microphones have helped preaching is a very different question. To tell you the truth, I had not thought about this at all. I always hated microphones and still do -- especially those that hang on the ear and extend around the cheek toward the mouth. But you cannot get away from them. They are literally everywhere in churches. We have them for a variety of reasons -- many of them also not ancient but modern. We have to have microphones because we record these services and broadcast them and we need to have something to broadcast and record. We have them because we presume that it is too much for the preacher to preach without them and so we have microphones to amplify the voice of the speaker to replace the need for him to learn how to preach, how to project his voice, and how to provide a room in which preaching does not need amplification. But have they helped preaching and not just the hearing of the sermon?
The complainer I referenced was not the first to raise this question. “Many people will lament the disappearance of the Latin Mass from the Catholic Church without realizing that it was a victim of the microphone on the altar.” [Marshall McLuhan 1911–1980). He was Roman Catholic. The guy who said the medium is the message. He later said: “Latin wasn’t the victim of Vatican II; it was done in by introducing the microphone. A lot of people, the Church hierarchy included, have been lamenting the disappearance of Latin without understanding that it was the result of introducing a piece of technology that they accepted so enthusiastically.” McLuhan, the Canadian communications theorist and educator, was a critic of the potent influence of television, computers, and other electronic means of disseminating information over the information being disseminated. I don't know about his comments regarding the Latin Mass and the Vatican II Mass but I would apply his words to preaching. PA systems have not exactly helped preaching even though they have helped mediocre preachers to be heard. I am not opposed to the preacher being heard. What I am worried about is the lack of preparation and conviction that seems to be a description of preaching problems today and, I would emphasize, the confusion of talking with preaching or imparting information with preaching. Preaching is not the same as talking and not simply imparting information. Preaching is the application of the Word to the situation of the hearer. The words of the sermon surely do inform but they proclaim, convict, absolve, and direct the hearer. I fear the the sound amplification systems across the churches have given preachers an opportunity to be lazy -- if not by what they say then by how they say it. So much for my rant today.
[Marshall McLuhan, Liturgy and the Microphone. First published in: “The Critic” 1974, vol. 33, no. 1, October-December, pp. 12–17; reprinted in: Eric McLuhan and Jacek Szklarek (eds.), The medium and the light: Reflections on Religion, Toronto: Stoddart 1999, pp. 107-116, quote from p. 112.]
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