Photography, the New Iconography of the Church
Photography is a modernization of iconography telling the story and represents the community at Brainard Avenue Baptist Church. Iconography is a religious understanding of visual arts that holds symbolic theological significance (Wagnall and Funk 1). Historically, this idea has manifested itself within Judaism in the Old Testament, intertestamental periods, and the many traditions in the Church age. Images are icons as they represent something of more excellent value than themselves. They are not worth much, except for the literal materials and time to make them. The image has special meaning within a particular context, such as icons of saints in the Orthodox Church (DeBoer). For Brainard Avenue Baptist Church, iconography has been a cliché topic that does not fit into any of the church's doctrines. If images have meaning and significance, there needs to be further explanation done within the church to have a theological perspective on images in the church.
Brainard Avenue Baptist Church has no real theological articulation of the church’s images and media in their doctrinal statement. The church already uses photography for many different applications, through the existing exemplification the church shows what their general position on images. The church’s website hosts images positioned to represent the church, yet most of these are stock photos that may indicate that no actual theological position is understood. A better example would be to draw from the church’s face book (photo directory) with portraits of its members. At the same time, the projector during the service shows images on a central screen that again show some stock photography. In talking with the pastor and some of the elders, many of the creative decisions lack theological understanding.
Since the church has not been at the forefront of a theological understanding and articulation of iconography in theology, breaking down a fundamental theology following what Brainard Avenue Baptist Church has already laid out in its doctrinal statement will be paramount. Since photography being manmade is an artificial concept and art form, sin distorts the image's meaning. At the same time, the device is a technological wizard at capturing one plane of view. It is important to see that the camera embodies human nature yet modified – accentuating the good and fallenness of man. In the singlular plane of view that the camera captures the meaning that a photo has can also represent a broader meaning. Depending on what photo is taken, who it is of, or who took it, there is meaning that it holds. Only through God's Word will there be any clarity on understanding the theology and theory behind images in the church.
Photography through a theological lens will clarify what the church needs to do in responding to their poorly made decisions during the turn of the century. Yet unless the church is willing to make changes and understand the very implications of their choices, congregants will continue to be distracted from the central focus on Christ their savior during the service. The members will only understand what is served to them using the silver plate of the black mirror, rather than the words handed down through generations and preserved by God. Only through the Word of God will Christians understand the theological significance and true meaning found in an image - especially at Brainard Avenue Baptist Church. The existing forms or image delivery can only be improved upon once the church holds a Christocentric understanding so that Christ might be magnified, and art only points to the one true King. The church requires changes based upon this articulation and further discussions that this understanding may muster.
The Church's Identity in Practice
Before the church makes any changes, there needs to be an identification of current practices that include images to understand the picture that the church has already set forth of their community. The creative choices that the church makes come through a small group of elders and deacons who come from a mixture of backgrounds, including theology, pastoral, trades, and a variety of others. The church was initially founded in 1961 by the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) and has remained part of the denomination ever since. The church has since kept the cookie-cutter doctrinal statement from 2002 that has been agreed upon by the SBC. The church itself means those core doctrines that cover salvation, sexuality, anthropology, and ecclesiology are all written to length. There has been no clear theological precedence set for the church's communications, especially through images. As the world's technology progresses, the church's response is to react rather than make a biblically led decision.
In asking why the church made these decisions, it was clear that the functionality of communications came before any theological function. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church has exemplified this through their decision to put a projector in the church, placing the screen front and center over the baptismal, blocking the cross that hangs on the wall. This decision prompted the eventual removal of hymnals and pews in the church. Before the Sunday service, announcements shuffle on the screen with images of books and people, none of which are of the church. The announcements flash on the screen, drawing attention to the center stage instead of fellow congregants. The creative decision to install a projector becomes theological when the whole service follows cascading images that draw congregants' thoughts away from Christ and to the technical wonder. Without any honest theological discussion before installing an image projection device, it has become part of the liturgical iconography that leads the church.
During the service, the projector receives programming inputs that guide the congregation in song, creed, and reading – the pastor uses the technology to post his points and notes to illustrate further spoken word. Visual liturgy guides the church, yet when technology malfunctions and acts in unintended ways, there is no crutch for the church to stand on. In one instance, during the sermon, the projector, which illustrated sermon points on a photo background, showed a blue screen. This screen flashing from time to time became distracting to the body gathered that Sunday morning. The pastor continued to preach, but the congregation found themselves distracted from the message. To put technology in place to project images without understanding the theological implications leads to instances such as the one above.
Many churches have websites for newcomers and members alike to keep up with the latest sermons preached and learn more about the church. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church follows in the footsteps of many modern churches with the same idea, although when the website presents the church as young stock models, there is a problem in representing the church for who they are. As the church seeks to demonstrate who they are to the world, genuineness is essential for keeping integrity. Stock photos are used throughout the internet without understanding the backgrounds of each person, believer or not; they are not part of the local body and misrepresent the members at the church. Misrepresentation, in this case, is breaking the ninth commandment from Exodus 20. For the church to be above reproach, in this case, would be to understand that every creative choice must start from the doctrinal statement and develop based on the held doctrines of the church.
In all how Brainard Avenue Baptist Church presents itself and leads its members, there is a clear theological drive to each decision even without knowledge. After speaking with Pastor Eric Brown after the Sunday service, images are considered in the church theologically; he expressed that any image made of Christ would break the second commandment. Yet, the problem is the limitation of theological thought within the category of images in the church. Just as books have images for covers and photos are taken of people at the church. Leadership in years past commissioned a face book for all the members of the church. Years, ago there was one created, still, in recent years, the church has gone through some significant changes, and some people left or moved while new members came to the church. The book has not been renewed and still is limited to pictures, names, and birthdays. Images were once said to represent a thousand stories; in the case of the face book, the church has neglected their own stories.
Images are essential to the church; in many cases, images have led people to Jesus Christ because of illiteracy. In recent decades people have found meaning, representation, and belonging in photos. Through means of social media, receiving a tag, and remembering the past, images are still a part of the Christian's daily life. Many of these images recall to a different time by applying filters or tagging a place ("Zooming into an Instagram City: Reading the local through social media") – to say images are limited in Christianity is the exact opposite of reality. With the uptick in images and finding belonging in a group, so do the images as people change. It is essential first and foremost to know and understand the theological implications that images have on a community of believers and how it plays into edifying the body of Christ. Even when meant for good, images can mislead and misrepresent the church because of sin. Walking this fine line will be necessary for every church leader to know and understand.
A Theology of Images for the Church
Photography is unlike any other visual media since the camera uses lenses to make an exact reflection captured on a sensor or film of some kind (How Cameras Work). In the journal Critical Inquiry, Roger Scruton gives a detailed description of a view on photography as a logical ideal, which represents both the object of the image reflected and the meaning it also represents (Scruton 578-579). The pictures that photography produces are of the very people pictured in the rectangular plane - meaning they are exact images of a moment in time of a particular person. These people can/ do also represent the broader groups of which they are part. At Brainard Avenue Baptist Church, the members have photographs of each other in and out of the church. These images represent the local body that meets there. While exploring the very theological ideals of photography, one must understand that the photos are already present before the very articulation of a biblical view.
In April of 2021, I received an invitation to photograph Brainard Avenue Baptist Church. Before I decided to come and take photos, facing me were my theological views and the ability to understand the very implications of my actions as a photographer in the church. Questions that came to mind included the nature of the camera and how the fallen nature of humanity poses implications on the craft. Other questions I had were along the lines of theological anthropology, the Law of God, and my view of God. These things all played into my choices and how I first asked Pastor Eric how, when, and where I should capture these moments and people in the auditorium. Before and after the service, questions require answering in and outside of the sacred time's opportunities. Any photos taken should be done with skill, yet not without a theological filter that drives interpretation – for the one sole focus of the church is always to be on Christ and taking care of His body.
In setting the stage, all humans have sinned and fallen short of God's glory, as Paul writes in Romans 3:23. In the Old Testament, David writes in Psalm 51:5, "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me" (ESV). In establishing the human condition, it is paramount to first look to the scriptures to see that man is guilty before God because of Adam, who first sinned and passed down a fallen human nature to which all humans now live (Grudem 496). Since humanity is born with this nature, there is nothing good that man can do without God because the presence of good is in God alone. To be without God leaves a person separated from the grace of God and unable to do good works (Rom. 7:18; 8:8; Titus 1:15). This theological understanding must drive the use of the camera and the representation of meaning that photography has. Since sin and the lack of good in fallen human nature are a starting place for understanding the theological ramifications of photography, images may hinder the believer's walk.
In an article from the Critical Inquiry from 1974, a German-born communications theorist writes, "Photography reaches into the world as an intruder, and therefore it also creates a disturbance" (Arnheim 151). The camera's presence and the photographer's movement impose on the community even while creating media to represent the church. The image is only one layer to the depth of connection that photography has to the community. The argument for a theology of photography in the church requires that the church have original photographs, understanding that the photographer is affected by sin, including each taking part in the event. One of the most frequently asked questions is whether the people are drawn away and distracted by a camera. The problem comes in when a photographer is present since the present is an anomaly to the congregation and distracts from the worship of God. Many other instances or distractions outside the service regarding the community fellowshipping together because of their commonality in Christ. Putting a camera anywhere in the presence of people who are not accustomed will create a disturbance and draw the attention to itself, abstracting the embodiment of believers.
The leadership's decisions at Brainard Avenue Baptist Church have not taken the matter of sin into account when photography is captured on a camera by a photographer. The intrusiveness of the action will generate an outcome based upon how the photographer holds themselves and interpret the people. No image will contain the same meaning as the photographer or the church leaders initially intended. For the same reason, people are fallen creatures, and every picture will have a fallen connotation if not viewed through the new nature that the Holy Spirit brings to each believer through Christ (2 Cor. 5:17; Eph. 4:22-24). It will only be possible to have images that reflect the truth of God's people if the photographer is first a Christian and, even better, a part of the local body that is walking with the Lord. Since the church is the body of Christ, it is a community effort for the photographer and the congregation to understand the meaning in each photograph. Without regeneration, a person remains in the same state that Romans 3:12 portrays. "All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one" (ESV). Fallen nature and sin permeate the everyday lives of all peoples unless God redeems and renews each one to become more like Christ. In the same way, photography represents good and evil, sometimes without knowledge causing others to stumble. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church should not consider any creative or technological advance without understanding the repercussions and acting (not reacting) biblically based upon theological precedence.
Knowing where a man falls short is first essential for the leadership to know, but it is important to look at the law set out by God for holy living. Living a holy life does not mean holding pharisaical standards but understanding what God has laid out for His people created in His very image. In the New Testament, Christ set up a new law or, as some theologians call it, the Law of Christ. In Matthew chapter 5-7, Jesus gives the sermon on the Mount. The words He chooses in this passage magnify the Law when He says, "You have heard" followed by the phrase "But I say to you," this idea is not to say one is saved by the law but by Christ's severity the concept of living a holy life for God. In the same way, the second commandment in Exodus 20:4 says, "You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth" (ESV). In Acts 17:29, Luke writes, "Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man" (ESV). These statutes must guide the Christian life since humans are the image-bearers of God, and anything that a human makes would be an abstraction from that. It is man's interpretation of God's image that the Bible commands humanity not to create.
In Eastern Orthodoxy, "The iconographer has a grave responsibility to ensure his or her icons are not simply works of the imagination" (University of St. Thomas). For the Orthodox tradition, it is crucial to understand that icons are the conduit by which the church's liturgy is played out. In "the absence of icons reduces the possibility for the faithful to experience liturgical life in its most complete form" (DeBoer 37). For the Eastern Orthodox Christian, the image represents the person and a broader meaning of interpretation, leading to a different ontological status bringing the Christian into a time of worship before God (DeBoer 39). Images as iconography was instituted into the church in 843 AD to bring unity and help illiterate Christians know God's Word (DeBoer 34). The Eastern Orthodox church includes pictures of Christ in their liturgy, which does go against the protestant understanding of scripture, especially the second commandment. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church being a protestant church does not venerate icons. Yet, it is crucial to understand historically what the church has done with images to develop a complete theology of images. Photography is a slightly different story since the photos represent the church but reflect the very people part of the community. Instead of just talking about someone or announcing a group during the service, it is better to use the projector to show an image of the person or group so that people in the audience can identify better who the church is.
Understanding the Law of God leads to a better understanding of the community's identity in Christ as they are a part of the broader scope of Christ's body and reflect the very image of God. Photography, in this case, is not an interpretation from one's mind but reflects the reality in a moment, in this case, a moment in the life of the church. "The ideal photograph also yields an appearance, but the appearance is not interesting as the realization of an intention but rather as a record of how an actual object looked" (Scruton 579). This idea is essential to understand since the photographs capture the ideal representation of the person as a reflection of them being in the image of God. This idea is different from a photo that purposefully represents God as means of worship. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church understands first that "Man is the special creation of God, made in His own image" (Southern Baptist Convention). After reading through the conventional statement that every Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) Church holds to, it is apparent that while man has the image of God, the church does not have any statement on pictures in the church. Through this, only the church leadership has the final say in this matter, rather than an orthodox articulation of theology.
Back in Genesis, there is a clear idea of what the image of God is, "being an image bearer is primarily functional – there is a royal task entrusted to people (Ps. 8:5), but being an image bearer is also relational" (Peterman and Schmutzer 42). These are key elements that reflect the community of believers through representation in photographic form. Since "human beings are God's unique representatives within God's creation […] sin twists the most majestic aspect of being image-bearers: the capacity to form relationships. [‘]There is no true being without communion[’]” (Peterman and Schmutzer 54). Furthermore, this idea is illustrated in the Christians' relationships in Christ since there is a unified common center in Christ. Photography in the church can reveal the meaning of this prophetically through images of the people in the church. In this case, the members communing and worshiping together is a common space. Being image-bearers, the Brainard Avenue Baptist Church members through photography reveal this very truth of their representative commonalities in communing together as the body of Christ.
It is not as much for the church to create new images to represent biblical truth and guide people in worship in the service as the Eastern Orthodox do. It fosters community and belonging through photography that images represent the very persons that make up the community. Therefore, the images are icons in a modern sense since the believer sees the image for the person God created and their identity in Christ. For instance, the church's face book contains images of all the church's attendees and members. These images should lead other members to pray for and know their community. All humans are forgetful people; for this reason, Christ institutes the physical elements of communion to serve as a reminder for believers to understand what Christ did two thousand years ago (Matthew 26:26-28). Photography is a physical image that reminds the believer in the context of Brainard Avenue Baptist Church of the community they belong to and the people they associate with. Photography in the church is a powerful tool for unifying and representing the believers who come together to worship Christ and walk-through life with Him together.
In an article by Mev Puleo from the journal ARTS, Puleo argues that images act prophetically by bearing witness of a person, people group, place, and event (Puleo 19). This same idea and images representing the community hold similar meanings when applied to the church. Puleo writes in her article on the prophetic significance of photography through the exemplary model of Sebastião Salgado's photographic work. Puleo writes, "Salgado's images are religious art for the twentieth century in the sense that they call us to contemplation and conversation […] to religious iconography […] aside from pure aesthetic appeal" (Puleo 23). The church, in this way, is represented in photography as a prophetic story that is the body of Christ. Harkening back to a previous point made, if the image is of a person in the church, it is also representative of the universal church and the community at the local church. Seeing a photograph taken years ago of fellow believers helps to orient the very belonging of the broader narrative that Christians have in the history of their local body and the universal church. The prophetic nature of photography helps to tell the story of believers with visuals that give tangibility to the spoken and written words that often accompany and photograph. In some ways, photography has the "ability to cross boundaries – to make the dead present, to allow viewers to "time travel" and visit the past, to make visible what otherwise remains invisible" (Sentilles 508).
Iconography in photography is a similar idea shared in Eastern Orthodoxy. Yet, still different from all other interpretations since photography is not a human's ideal but a reflection of the human. During the iconoclasm in 787 AD., a Byzantine Eastern Orthodox leader named John of Damascus declared "that holy images–icons–must not be rejected and indeed ought to be used in Christian worship" (Olson 301). Eastern Orthodox theology holds icons to a high standard and through them see a "window into heaven" (Olson 301). There is also a clear difference between icons and idols when the Orthodox adamantly say, "They are not worshiped. In fact, worship of them has always been strictly forbidden by those traditions" (Olson 302). Both the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic traditions both use images that represent Christ. This breaks the second commandment and goes against the protestant understanding of humanity being made in the image of God. Throughout the Old and New, Testament God has made it plain and clear that no man is to create an image that represents God. John Calvin writes, "We see how plainly God declares against all figures, to make us aware that all longing after such visible shapes is rebellion against him" (Calvin 91). For raw photography, it is impossible to create an image of God that would break the second commandment. It is vital that Brainard Avenue Baptist Church focuses on Christ and the Word of God given to humanity and uses photography as a representative communal tool. History helps clarify the truth of scripture and learn from the choice and decisions made throughout the millennia. Portraits, candid photos, landscapes, and other means of photography can be used in the church but are limited in the formatting and exclusion from the liturgy in the service.
Application for the Church
Understanding the theological and community-oriented significance of photography in the church must coincide with the creative decisions that both the laity and the leadership make. Based upon a theological view, the church can utilize photography to its fullest to portray a clear meaning of what it is to be a part of the body of Christ. The first example that is representative of the body of Christ is to update the face book often. Photography is a picture of a moment; as time moves forward from that moment, the photo is already history. For Brainard Avenue Baptist Church, it will be paramount that the face book receives updates with new members and existing members and their children maturing with age. Photography tells Brainard's story, and through the face book, it will be a legacy of Christians to look back on. For those who are alive in Christ and part of the local church, the face book can remind the body to pray for each other. The face book may even be an excellent place to keep prayer requests and pray for everyone in the church throughout the week. This idea falls into photography as iconography, helping people know the community of the local body of Christ and pray for each one. The face book also allows newcomers to get to know each of the members and who they are. The church, in this way, can understand and be reminded visually about who they are as a community.
Visual choices in the service and throughout the church should not include stock photography, primarily when representing people or church groups. The use of stock photography misrepresents the local body of believers and therefore becomes a lie told from the church. Stock photography needs to be removed so that the church might see themselves for who they are and not for an outside ideal. The projector is one of the tools that may need to be rethought since announcements that include photography sometimes have stock candid or portrait photos of people who are not part of the church. The trouble is that the Bible study announced is for the ladies in the church, yet the church demographics tend to lean towards an older generation. For example, if a photo of young women is used for the Bible study announcement, it is not representative of the group. The obvious will be to state that the age difference is not represented. A point that is not an obvious example is when the women in the image are unknown to the church and may even be against Christianity and what it stands for. To solve this problem, it would be good to forgo an image of people if the Bible study has never happened or to use a photo taken of the women in the church studying the Bible. Stock photos are problems for many churches, and in this case, Brainard Avenue Baptist Church has used these examples in the past.
An example of the misuse of images is the public website to the entire world to see who these people are. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church's website opens on the home page; at first, it is a blank site with minimal words; when one scrolls to the bottom of the home page, a stock photograph of young people who do not even attend the church represents the local community. Over the photo, the title reads "Connect Groups" over the image, when the people in the picture are not a part of the local body of believers. It is better to include photographs of the very people who attend the church and show to the world who these people are. There are a few hurdles to jump when posting pictures of people online, the first being consent. It will likely be essential for the church to address this point and have an agreement in a member's meeting. While there may be some opposition to this action, it will be helpful to present this theological argument for using original photographs in the church. Once the agreement is reached for the website and the church has a set of original photos, it will be necessary for the church to include pictures on important web pages to show the community aspect of the church instead of only having a write-up. A great example of this is the page called "What to Expect," where the church outlines in words who they are, how the church is led, and how they look. Images are important for telling the whole story and bringing a more concrete representation to the world of who the church is.
A Proposed Solution
The Modernization of Images in the Church
Iconography has often seemed to be a wrong doctrine within the protestant church, yet in history, images in the church have told stories from the Bible – even by Luther himself. In the first translation of the Bible into Low German, Luther had a woodcut made to express his biblical exegesis through an image portraying various biblical themes (Meinardus 144). This idea has never gone away throughout the ages, and with the advent of photography in 1826, the church had never developed any concrete theology of photography as iconography. Many secular philosophers and psychologists have studied photography in detail, and yet the Christian point of view stands to be decided.
Photography does have theological consequences for the body of Christ and must be understood locally within the context of each church. With the diversity of believers, every church leader must think about how images impact the church, separate from Exodus 20:4. At Brainard Avenue Baptist Church, it will be necessary for the pastors, elders, and deacons to know the impacts of sin and fallen humanity, God's Law, and the prophetic implications of photography. Before making any decision, God's Word must be open and studied, influencing every decision the church makes – including the ones on the creative plane with images. Practically photography will draw a community together and remind them of who they are as the Body of Christ. Removing all the stock images from the church, the believers will be more at home since the very people in the church will represent who they are and not another ideal from outside the church. Brainard Avenue Baptist Church can find the intentional relationship between community and representation by seeing the community's objectives through the association of image and person (Scruton 579). Images are already a part of Brainard Avenue Baptist Church's life. It will be necessary for the church to develop a theological understanding to guide and protect the congregation.
Work Cited
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