Assistive Listening Knowledge Base
  • Advocacy resource
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Places of Worship-Assistive Listening

From https://assistivelisteningknowledgebase.org/evidence/cha-2026-places-of-worship/ · record checked 9 October 2026

  • Center for Hearing Access
  • Center for Hearing Access, The John G. Shedd Institute for the Arts

Nonprofit advocacy (Center for Hearing Access, an initiative of The John G. Shedd Institute for the Arts)

Summary

An advocacy page for churches, mosques and synagogues on where to provide assistive listening, how to promote it, and where to find faith-specific disability resources.

Key findings

  • Calls hearing loops and FM/RF systems "invaluable" for taking part in religious communities, and says that without an effective system many worshippers sit in frustration "Or worse, stay at home instead".
  • Lists possible locations and systems: sanctuaries (hearing loop, FM system); parlours (loop, FM); smaller study rooms (permanent or portable loop or FM); confessionals and private counselling rooms (permanent or portable loop, personal FM system); and funerals and memorial services.
  • Offers a bulletin paragraph for a looped church, telling telecoil users to switch to T and others that they "may check out a portable receiver and headphones from an usher", plus a two-page template and checklist for promoting a loop, FM/RF or infrared system.
  • Quotes a member of a Grand Rapids, Michigan, congregation reporting that, as members had their telecoils activated, loop users rose from one to over 10 in four months.
  • States that British houses of worship, including cathedrals, are extensively looped, and offers lists of hearing loops by faith tradition on request; it links to its separate pages on Auracast and on audio over Wi-Fi, and to disability resources of more than a dozen US denominations.

Limits

An advocacy page without data beyond one congregant's quote; the Center labels hearing loops "Consumer Preferred" elsewhere on its site. It gives no evidence for its statement about British houses of worship. The page shows no date; its metadata gives first publication on 19 February 2024 and a last change on 17 September 2026.

Read the original

centerforhearingaccess.org/places-of-worship

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Cited in

Cite this source

Center for Hearing Access. Places of Worship-Assistive Listening. Center for Hearing Access, The John G. Shedd Institute for the Arts. n.d. https://centerforhearingaccess.org/places-of-worship/ (accessed 9 October 2026).

The original gives no date, so the citation says “n.d.”. The accessed date is when this library last checked the link; use the date you read it. To point readers to this summary instead, link to https://assistivelisteningknowledgebase.org/evidence/cha-2026-places-of-worship/

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