Technology & The Sacred Space
Exploring Contemporary Religious Experiences
In this post I will be addressing and sharing ways in which the three Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity & Islam) utlize VR to modernize the religious experience.
The arrival of relatively inexpensive 360‐degree cameras and virtual reality (VR) headsets brings new possibilities to the study of religion by allowing students to become virtually immersed in distant religious environments at very little cost. These tools can serve as the basis for assignments that help to engage students, users and meet core learning outcomes such as empathetic understanding and ethnographic analysis of religious places, stories, different rituals, and behaviors in light of theories of religion.
After watching these videos I came to the conclusion that when the video is combined with 360-degree audio recording, there is a sense of presence in a 3-dimensional space which engages the user and feels more realistic to them than watching a just regular 2-dimensional video. I believe that these Immersive experiences are perceived as empathy drivers because they allow participants to put themselves in the place of another in ways that are not possible by other means of communication and storytelling
These innovations have provided more consumer-friendly virtual reality opportunities to a wide range of users. While some may use the technology in various way, I think that these platform could also be used to spread the message of faith.
Judaism :
Christianity :
Islam :
Final Thoughts :
Personally, I believe the changing world we live today needs people who are willing to reach all corners of the earth, even the virtual ones. I admire how these different faiths are utilizing VR to tell religious stories and enabling us to experience them, and allowing us to revisit a time we cannot go back in time to. Someway, and somehow I want to try them all!
