Kendal Monthly Meeting holds its weekly meetings for worship in the Kendal library, which is rearranged for the purpose. While this has many benefits, not least that it is easily accessible to residents in health care, libraries are not designed to provide good hearing of a person on the other side of the room. Additionally, many who attend our meetings for worship have difficulty hearing even under good conditions. This Fall a concern regarding the difficulty of hearing vocal messages in meeting for worship was raised again, as it had been periodically in the past. The Meeting had always resisted initiating a traveling microphone and the Meeting had no authority to change the room to meet its needs. This year a resident of Kendal who does not attend meetings for worship hit upon a solution based on the proximity of the library to the auditorium and its sound system. During November the Meeting experimented with the provision of ear phones that would pick up the electronic signals from the auditorium’s sound system, signals that were created by a feed from a microphone standing in the center of the library during meetings for worship. The Meeting has learned how to use this technology and it is now working well, much to the delight of the hearing impaired. Attendance and vocal ministry have picked up.
From Tom Paxson,
Clerk of Kendal Monthly Meeting
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