I’m not a doctor. I’m not a lawyer. I’m not a statistician.
I’m a pastor and theologian (doesn’t theologian sound so pretentious?).
Thus as a pastor/theologian, I can’t speak intelligently about the severity of the pandemic, nor about the dangers of governmental overreach. Like many of you, I can be concerned about all these things, without inerrant answers to them. This seems to me to be one of the problems we’re facing, so many people speak with expertise without having any. And it’s funny, it’s easy to point the finger at “those losers with bad information,” but I do it too. When I hear someone, who is obviously consuming a different news narrative than me, I find an anger welling up inside: “THEY have obviously bought into the narrative,” as if I, WISE TYLER, have not bought into any such opposing narratives. “God I thank you that I’m not like other men, foolish, manipulated by (right-wing) (left-wing) media.”
And THIS is what I want to pay attention to as a pastor. Because scripture doesn’t say a ton about how western democracies should balance public policy in the midst of a pandemic. And it really doesn’t say much about rights (as important as they may be from a societal perspective).
But scripture says a lot about anger. And resentment. And pride. And contempt, condescension, and scorn. Positively, it says a lot about love of neighbor, joy in the Lord, peace-making, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
So I can’t say what your church (or family or social circle or you as an individual) should do. I do think gathering face to face is important. But perhaps more important than what we do is HOW we do it. Our posture.
So say your church prayerfully decides to meet. What does this gathering look like? What does God see? What does our community see? Is it a gathering of resentful people, clinging to our rights and freedoms as sacrosanct? Unified under a common ideology: “To each his own?” Eagerly flipping the bird to our left-leaning state leadership?
Or. . .
Is this a gathering characterized by a transcendent love, joy, peace and hope? The kind of hope that makes others ask about us, because we’re not just another grievance group: “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander. . .” 1 Peter 3:15-16 (NIV)
And yes, we will be misunderstood. Some may see Christian gatherings as deeply irresponsible and putting the broader community at risk. This has actually always been the case; from the very beginning, Christianity has been maligned, sometimes for good reasons, sometimes not. For example, the early church was accused of cannibalism when taking communion (Fact check: False).
Even if we disagree about the risk involved in our gatherings, our obligation here is to respond with “gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience.” So instead of fighting fire with fire in verbal fights (especially online), and clinging to our rights, we should do our best to gently explain why we are choosing to meet.
So for example, when a church in town decided to continue meeting, someone commented on their Instagram:
“When religious people have their heads so far up their a____ that they are selfish enough and more willing to break the law and put more people at risk of death than to split up mass or hold virtual gatherings. . .”
How do you respond to something like this? It’s easy to fume with anger, to dismiss, or to lash back out. And of course, the post isn’t very charitable and doesn’t assume good will. But neither were many of the responses to it. (If you ever doubt the depravity of humanity, or the need for Christ’s return, just read the comments’ section anywhere).
What might be a better way to respond? I think a better way to talk about our gathering is not along the lines of rights but responsibility. So if I had a conversation with this person, I might say something like:
“I totally agree with you that we need to take this pandemic seriously. The LAST thing I want to do is spread this virus to someone else. But I also think that we need to take isolation seriously. There’s a lot of evidence that the mental health tole of this year is massive. In a recent Gallup Survey on Mental Health, the only people who self-reported better mental health from 2019 to 2020 were weekly church attenders. Every other category of people went backward. For the sake of our society’s mental, emotional, and social well-being, I strongly feel that people need this weekly gathering. I know for me, when I get isolated, my mind goes to bad places and I’m not a great person. So I truly believe I have this obligation to meet with others, to help them and for them to help me. I respect your opinion though, and so I wonder what you think we could potentially do to take this pandemic more seriously in our gatherings?
We can’t win them all. But the more we can step outside of our echo chamber, to do our best to have a great reputation in this community, the more winsome I think we’ll be to those of different perspectives outside of the church.
What are some ways that you think the church can improve its posture and reputation during these times?
-Tyler
