While it is easy to see the reasons why legal or medical transcription are important, it might be harder to see the reasoning behind sermon transcription. While the action isn't taking place in a courtroom or operating table, religious transcription can be very interesting and rewarding, and it is an invaluable service for religious leaders.
Reach More People
Sermon transcription helps religious leaders reach more people. Not all parishioners are well enough to travel. A transcribed sermon can easily be mailed, emailed or printed and delivered by a friend to anyone in any state.
Also, many religious leaders are finding that posting their sermons online is giving them access to people that otherwise would be unable to attend their services. Would-be parishioners all over the world are able to easily download their sermons months after they're given; meaning that their words touch several times more people than the original recitation did.
Searchable Documents
It's easy to think that the person who wrote the sermon should be able to remember what they wrote. However, just considering the amount of public speaking that religious leaders do is a reminder that multiple sermons every week in addition to all of the weddings, funerals and many other community milestones religious leaders speak at is simply too much for anyone to remember.
Sermon transcriptionists provide organized electronic documents that can easily be searched by keyword, date, verse or event. This includes correcting the grammar used in the sermon, deleting all of the miscellaneous interjections that happen (the occasional "umm", "you know", "like", etc.), and referencing scriptures and quotes with their original sources. So yes, transcription is an invaluable resource for religious leaders and pastors, although it might not be a service many think of using.
Permanent Records
Transcribed sermons provide people with very important and easily sharable documents about their lives and their loved ones. People researching family trees will be able to gather the information they need more easily. And those that missed important events, or were maybe too young to remember them, will get to re-experience the words that were shared.
