ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on “Media Ministry” with this statement: Religion, projected by electronic media, is presented through an entertainment perspective and an ideal-norms format which simplifies it according to an least objectionable program principle. It argues that religious activity was rapidly becoming a significant part of that segment of American culture being created and presented within and through the mass media. The chapter argues that prime-time television was loaded with moral messages, and that media created the impression that some sort of religious revival was under way. It also argues that religious practice and experience outside of media are changing as a result of the general media or television consciousness that pervades American culture. The major cultural change is essentially a matter of practicing and experiencing religion and morality through the formal properties of television as opposed to the traditional formal properties of the church and ecclesiastic organization.
