Pandemic change and the church: Shifts in the way we live drive new approaches | Local

Twelve years earlier, a colleague of Frerichs told him the future of the church was online. “I thought he was insane,” he recalled. And in 2020, less than a week before church doors were shut for COVID-19 protocols, Frerichs was approached by a member about doing a broadcast, to which he expressed concerns about staffing and copyright issues for producing online content.

But in the past two years, Frerichs has bought into the digital world of Christianity. After moving worship services and leadership meetings online in a matter of three days, the leadership at St. Andrew’s had to bear the burden of the safety measures and what that meant for the congregation. Without the ability to gather, Frerichs had to commit time, energy and resources — including new cameras and microphones and an AI video editing software — to put St. Andrew’s online.

The COVID-19 pandemic has sparked conversations nationally around accessibility and diversity in spaces that, before March 2020, benefited from being exclusive. For decades, churches have stuck to traditions that often overlooked the changing political and social climates of the past decade. As discussions amplified concerns over accessibility, mental health care and inclusion for all groups, churches that were rooted in old ways were forced to change.

The way Americans interact with institutions is also changing. These changes are encouraging churches to reevaluate how they engage both Christians with changing, progressive values and Christians who have more traditional expectations of the church.

“People of all ages are looking for authentic integrity,” Frerichs said.

For this Easter Sunday, Columbia clergy talk about how the pandemic changed their relationship to technology and a shifting social climate and forced a reconsideration of what church can be in the early 21st century.

Before the pandemic, churches nationally were dealing with slowly declining numbers in attendance and religious affiliation. While Christians still make up the majority of the U.S. population, numbers have been steadily declining for over a decade.

The Pew Research Center reported in December that 63% of U.S. adults self-identify as Christian, down from 75% a decade earlier. The pandemic only accelerated this decline. After churches shut their doors with everyone else, some churchgoers never came back.

Father Chris Cordes of Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church has witnessed attendance issues firsthand. In their annual report in October, the attendance numbers were around 75% of what they were two years ago; the surge of cases due to the omicron strain of COVID-19 caused numbers to dip again. Before the pandemic, Our Lady of Lourdes’ numbers were down from 10 and 15 years earlier but had remained steady for the previous five years.

While local churches interviewed for this story agree it may be too early to tell how the pandemic impacted attendance or monetary giving, Pew Research reported in March that attendance remains unchanged since last fall, when in-person operations began reemerging. The churches report an increase in giving at the start of the pandemic, but some think the financial implications of the pandemic are yet to come.

The relationships to physical spaces that existed prior to the pandemic were lost as quickly as the relationships among people. Now, churches are tackling issues of low engagement as they reopen, creating questions of what makes a community and what keeps it engaged.

“That is probably the $100,000 question all of us are asking,” Cordes said. “What is it that causes people to drift or leave? And are there ways we can actually address that?”

St. Andrew’s Lutheran, Calvary Episcopal Church and First Baptist Church, among others, acknowledge the benefits technology has had in members’ abilities to fully engage and plan to continue online offerings. Specifically, churches have found the accessibility of Zoom and other platforms helpful in combating declining engagement, especially for young families and members with health concerns.

At First Presbyterian Church, online resources originally intended for people who were not able to attend worship for health reasons during the pandemic are now one way they hope to introduce new members to the congregation.

“In the future, it’s going to be like our front porch, so to speak, for people who are checking out our congregation,” the Rev. Marvin Lindsay said.

Other congregations have found that online resources have helped expand their community outside of Columbia. First Baptist, with an LGBTQ+ affirming congregation, has had new members join from other Missouri towns where they don’t have access to progressive churches in their area, according to the Rev. Dr. Carol McEntyre.

At Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, online resources have helped preserve the congregation by allowing members who have moved out of town to still attend services, according to Church Clerk Nancy Stockett.

At Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbia, the Rev. Molly Housh Gordon’s technological changes during the pandemic spurred physical adjustments to the church’s space. Not only will virtual resources continue, but the congregation raised money to implement structural changes to the building including ramps to further the accessibility of in-person operations, with the help of its Disability Justice and Inclusion team.

Leaders believe online resources will be vital in moving forward. However, not all aspects of church can translate to the online world. Many denominations are still tackling questions of how to “pass the peace” — greeting each other — in less physical ways or how to provide communion safely.

At the height of the pandemic, Holy Communion, baptisms and funerals were all impacted. Hospital and home visits were limited or canceled altogether. Today, some of these operations have yet to return. Calvary Episcopal still does not provide a full communion during in-person worship services, and Our Lady of Lourdes still does not offer chalices.

At Friendship Missionary Baptist, even after returning to in-person worship, many still notice the lack of physical touch within the congregation. While they are gradually returning to physical contact in worship, Stockett said it’s especially hard for older congregants, including herself, who were raised in churches where physical touch was central to their congregation and the experience of worship.

“Some of the seniors, they need that hug. They want that hug,” Stockett said. “It’s something about not having that physical contact, it’s just kind of an emptiness.”

Stockett also acknowledged that while it’s hard to minimize physical touch in happy moments, it has been especially hard during somber moments, like at funerals.

Although online services were a benefit to church communities, the inability to partake in some operations forced many to reevaluate why they attend church, according to Monsignor Gregory Higley of Sacred Heart Catholic Church.

“That is sort of the silver lining, to some extent, of the pandemic experience for practicing Catholics and even non-practicing Catholics,” Higley said. “(They) have had sort of a renaissance in the practice of their faith. A rebirth.”

Many churches rely on word-of-mouth to acquire new members. Stockett said it can be as simple as someone recognizing her in a grocery store. The Rev. Ann Dieterle, who joined Calvary Episcopal in November, said one thing churches have lost to the pandemic are “non-religious church relationships” with the outside community.

“If you show up in the same place, at the same time, every day or every week, it’s almost by osmosis, you’re going to start to recognize people and form those relationships on an organic level,” Dieterle said. “That organic level of community formation (has been) somewhere between hampered and nonexistent.”

Churches are now deciding how to move forward. With modern day changes like technology and the changing social climate born from the pandemic, churches are deciding whether they will keep changing with the times or go back to pre-pandemic ways that feel comfortable.

At Sacred Heart Catholic Church, Higley is placing the importance back on fellowship and sees his role as a priest is to focus on the Gospel.

“People can read in the newspapers or online what the Pope says, what the bishops say, or other leaders, particularly in politics,” Higley said. “They don’t need me to tell them anything from the pulpit.”

However, Gordon from the Unitarian Universalist Church embraces these social conversations. A central mission of the Unitarian Universalist Church is social activism, especially in regard to supporting Black and LGBTQ+ communities.

“We are collectively passionate about putting our beliefs in human dignity and liberation into action,” Gordon said. “We have never been a congregation that wanted to avoid talking about social issues.

Many leaders are focusing on the Gospel as a way to bring people of differing backgrounds together. Lindsay at First Presbyterian believes in the idea of a common uniting task.

“There’s the promise there that whatever our political divisions or theological divisions are, that if God calls us to a demanding common task, those can be transcended,” Lindsay said.

Pastor Michael Acock from Christian Fellowship Church has also kept a “faith as foundational” approach to his leadership. Acock compared it to “kintsugi,” the Japanese pottery technique that repairs broken items with gold. While his congregation is made up of different backgrounds, their faith can act as the gold glue that holds them together. He wants to encourage his congregation to be “Christian first,” as opposed to tying their identities to a political party or belief about COVID-19.

Churches are also reconsidering how they define community. Frerichs acknowledges it is no longer tied to the physical space of St. Andrew’s. Lindsay believes the future of these communities is “short-term, high impact, high commitment ministries.”

This approach involves Christian and non-Christians, such as through Habitat for Humanity, or First Presbyterian’s current sponsorship of an Afghan refugee family in the community. Lindsay believes that mission will drive worship instead of the other way around.

Pastor Jeremy Linneman from Trinity Community Church believes a hyperlocal approach is best moving forward. Instead of interacting with the Columbia community as a whole congregation, Linneman encourages individual interactions so as not to create extra burdens.

“Our focus has been more on empowering people to see their nine-to-fives as a mission field and as an area of service,” Linneman said. “We are intentionally a really low-event church … . We try to shift that focus into empowering them to be where they already are.”

Linneman also hopes to see more collaborations among churches in the future. Linneman is part of a small group of reverends that collaborated throughout the pandemic on decisions such as COVID-19 protocols, which he found beneficial to himself and his congregation.

Something else the pandemic highlighted is mental health care. While communities can provide support, the pandemic exacerbated growing rates of loneliness in the U.S.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found in 2020 that reports of anxiety and depression symptoms, increased substance abuse, stress and thoughts of suicide in adults were nearly double pre-pandemic numbers, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

Part of the Trinity Community Church budget is allocated to provide professional counseling to congregants in need and support local Christian counselors. Christian Fellowship hosted an emotional wellness workshop in the fall, and First Baptist Church held a trauma service last year.

“We have to help people understand that faith is not separated out from your emotional well-being and your mental well-being and your physical well-being,” Acock said. “The answer is not just pray more.”

While mental health concerns are not new, the pandemic has made them widespread, and many are being more intentional in their attempts to address it.

“Giving people the space in worship to center themselves in their own body and in God … is important,” McEntyre said. “Our souls have a speed limit. They cannot move at the pace that our society moves.”

Frerichs said despite the difficulties of the past two years, he has also seen it provide room for hope and opportunities for change to better serve congregants.

“As difficult as it has been … it has forced a generativity and a creativity that has been pretty exciting,” Frerichs said. “Most of all, as a church, we ground our hope in the same things we’ve ground our hope in for 2,000 years.”