Hallelujah! Churchgoing in the VR

At a recent exhibition in the Gnadenkirche church in Chemnitz-Borna, visitors can use VR glasses to gain an extraordinary insight into distant sacred buildings. But how do churches and VR fit together?

Virtual reality in a place of worship - is that possible? Why not! For the VR project at the Gnadenkirche in Chemnitz-Borna, several images were taken in Berlin Cathedral, among other places, and put together. "When visitors put on the glasses, they stand in the centre of the room, can look up and down and get a panoramic view," explains Matthias Hövelmann (53) from the "novopano" development team.

VR in training and school

There are already other ideas as to what VR could be used for: "The glasses could be used to train church guides," says Immo Wittig (60) from the Otto Bartning Church Building Working Group.

If you think further, other options open up: VR, like the project Living stones has also proved to be a good teaching aid for religious education. Because whether it's a church, synagogue, mosque or Sikh temple - with VR, pupils can gain an insight into any building.

But church services in VR are also unthinkable. Theoretically, there would be the possibility of a live stream with a 360° camera so that you could attend from home or even from your hospital bed.

Church service in VR

There is already an English-language church service in a specially animated 3D church in the VR social hub "Altspace". Services are held here weekly with a US pastor. The international congregation seems to be quite constant, albeit manageable in terms of numbers - which probably has to do with the spread of VR.

The services have their own "liturgy" consisting of approx. 30 minutes of worship music, prayer, sermon, prayer and blessing (together approx. 1-1.5 hours). Despite the usable space for movement, there is not much interaction here, in fact there tends to be less than in a normal church service, as the music also invites people to listen without singing along and nobody feels exposed to social pressure. The church room is only accessible during events.

Source: media.tag24 / digitale-kirche