Larry D. Lauer

It’s interesting to explore the reasons why one denomination or religion might use media more effectively than another.  Is it a matter money?  Or is it a matter of the skills and interests of those in charge?  Or is it something more illusive?  In short, why does one group use television to spread the word far and wide, and another continue to worship almost exclusively in buildings.

I explored these questions many years ago when television was new. But today the media landscape has broadened to include the Internet, websites, email, cell phones, texting, Facebook, Twitter, and more. 

So what does determine which groups choose to use media, and which ones don’t?  I have found that looking at the basic nature of each medium, and comparing  those characteristics to how each group approaches its fundamental religious  subject matter, can give us very important clues, if not answers.

Electronic media tend to favor very simple content. Its use normally requires reducing complex ideas to simple message points. For example, too much factual information on television can quickly become boring. Facebook is a vehicle primarily for maintaining relationships and is not an effective communicator of complex ideas.  Twitter requires messages to be conveyed in only 140 characters and is a tool that is mostly effective when mobilizing action. Email can inform in short paragraphs. Texting is best at connecting. Cell phones allow talking on the go.  

Television is especially interesting because it effectively combines simple messaging with dramatic and emotional experiences. Cameras, editing, scenery, music, pacing and impassioned performance are naturals for television, and denominations and churches that can combine a simple message with these to produce a religious experience find it a natural, and in some cases a primary, medium.

So denominations that see their content in terms of simple clear messages, and find it natural to translate that into more emotional religious experiences, seem to be much more at home with television and other forms of new media.  On the other hand, those that see their content as requiring  study and interpretation are more likely to find  television unsuited to their fundamental nature and approach.

So how does all this relate to extremist religions? Many of these movements use the emotional power of satellite television effectively. All use Facebook and Twitter to build and sustain relationships, and to mobilize action across borders.  These are really communities of interests, or subcultures, and they are effectively held together across the globe using social media. And for the most part their content is simple and uncomplicated.

TCU has a religion department and is also affiliated with a divinity school with scholars who study these issues. Recently the divinity school launched a strategic planning process with the underlying theme that the seminary of tomorrow will not look like the seminary today. It will be interesting to see  how the use of new media will influence the plan and the future of seminary education.  

Religion and media is also a topic for our Honors College Colloquium this fall.  We all know that in one way or another our religious beliefs influence everything we think and do.  Even though church and state in our country are constitutionally separated, religion  finds its way into virtually all matters of our politics and society, and it certainly is at the heart of much international conflict. What role media plays in all this is clearly a central concern for society, and is worthy of our ongoing consideration.

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I often recall a dinner conversation I had in Rome some years ago with the travel agent that helped one of my colleagues with study abroad logistics. He said bluntly, “Everyone I know loves their ‘idea of America,” but they don’t understand much of what your government does.”  Ever since then I have been grappling with the issue of communicating government administrative policy to many complicated domestic and foreign audiences vs. just getting a simple “idea of America” understood.

Last week’s blog addressed the challenges faced by the White House as new and returning presidents face communicating their policies to audiences that will hear what they want to hear no matter what is said. The reality is that communication will be breaking down all the time.  Audiences must be prioritized, traditional and new media tactics selected for each, and many separate initiatives must be undertaken over time in order to achieve minimal progress.  And no matter what is said, enemies and competitors will fire back with their own set of strategically planned initiatives. 

Is it possible for a government to articulate a simple idea about values and culture with credibility?  Can the simple  “idea of America” come through in the same way that the travel agent in Rome described?

Some have concluded that government policy always must be shaped around economic and security realities, and that a government’s communication will always be with mixed and uncertain success.  Those people and countries threatened by this will always retaliate in some way. There will be allies and enemies, advocates and critics. And so many strategic communicators have come to think that the best way to get the fundamental “idea of America” across is to organize ordinary Americans to meet with people in other cultures. This way our basic values of individual freedom and justice can be experienced first hand.

And so several efforts have been made in recent years to explore the feasibility of establishing a non-governmental, or in some cases a quasi-governmental, organization to operate totally independent of government to establish citizen-to-citizen exchanges and programs with the simple purpose of demonstrating how ordinary free and independent Americans look and act. One of these was undertaken by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.  Known as the SAGE project, the result was a business plan to establish a non-profit, non-governmental organization to stimulate and finance projects that will bring about a better understanding of Americans of all types.  Currently, a former assistant secretary of state for public diplomacy is seeking the funding and other support necessary to bring this organization into existence.

My TCU Honors College students are discussing these issues.  Last week we imagined what a new or second term president faces on “day one” trying to communicate administrative policy in light of what was said during the campaign and the realities of the existing friendly and hostile audiences all over the world!  This week we will look at the potential of citizen-to-citizen public diplomacy, and the role international higher education and new media might play in it. 

On a given day communication is breaking down all around us.  But then each day is a new day, and the determined among us keep trying.  One step at a time is the name of the game.

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