A year since church got weird
Alittle over a year ago, things got weird. All the things, including church. By the end of March in 2020 we were supposed to have stopped the spread, flattened the curve ... and all the other stuff we had no idea about when the pandemic started.
All aspects of our lives suffered by basically vanishing before our eyes in March of last year.
Work was different, assuming you were lucky enough to still have a job. Our social lives were on indefinite hold. There were no sports, no dinein restaurants, no club meetings, no parties, no wedding or even funerals.
One of the things that went away almost instantly a year ago was church.
Throughout the entire history of organized religion, the most fundamental pieces to the puzzle was inperson gathering of believers, regardless of the faith or creed.
In March of last year, across much of the world, those gathering stopped.
Churches equipped to go online did their best to move quickly in that direction. Some smaller congregations tried drive-in services, while in some places people of various faiths brazenly chose to continue to worship in person, even leading to fines, government intervention and high profile court cases. Like I said ... things got weird.
For our family and our church, the struggle was a common one. We had literally just moved towns on March 14, 2020, in part to be closer to where we’d chosen to worship. Little did we know when we started that process, the week after we sold our old house, we wouldn’t step foot inside a church, school, restaurant, stadium or arena for many months to come.
Our church has a wonderful Sunday service, well planned events, solid summer camps and VBS activities and incredible children engagement full of amazing volunteers and church employees. Going for all of that to sitting on a couch and watching a YouTube video on TV in your pajamas while trying to get your kids to stay quiet enough to hear yourself think is a drastic change in worship style.
Don’t get me wrong ... going from bed to Sunday worship in 3 minutes
without having to get dressed is a plus, but it’s just not the same. Also, we were very thankful to continue to have a connection, even if only virtually, to our place of worship and a common gathering with the people we missed seeing on Sundays.
Often on Sundays last spring, we’d watch the lesson online then throw on some outside clothes and head out into nature somewhere with a picnic lunch. Now that life is back at least somewhat to being busy, that’s something I miss from the early quarantine days of 2020.
There’s something to be said about the energy church gatherings bring. Walking through the doors to smiling faces and welcoming words can change your day, even your week. Handshakes and hugs are both experiences we’re not fully back to yet, but we’re getting close in some cases, and back in the “old days” of early 2020, we still had that.
By July our church had a drive in fireworks service in the parking lot, and several drive through events throughout the summer. Our kids even did “camp in a box,” and they love every minute of it.
Coming from someone who isn’t necessarily a people person, and from someone who prefers a quiet corner in silence to a crowded room, even I miss a good full house on Sunday morning where you have to say “excuse
me” to make your way down a full row of seats.
I also miss the days without without masks and the smell of hand sanitizer and Lysol everywhere, but since our church started socially distanced services at end of summer, it’s WAY better than nothing at all.
Let me say that for the homebound, the disconnected and the temporarily sick or disabled church member, online church is an amazing way to plug into a congregation and connect to God. Even then, those individuals need human contact when possible, making visitation such an important part of the religious experience.
There’s no replacement for human connection. Not just for the intangible vibes you get from an in-person smile or laugh, but for the accountability and friendships those connections bring.
For our kids, 2020 meant they couldn’t see their friends at school at afterschool activities, or at church. Keeping the kids safe has remained a priority at our church and it’s not hard for them to see that things still aren’t back to normal, and we have to explain that it’s just the way it is for the time being, but hopefully fully normal will return sooner rather than later.
I can’t speak for services at other churches or other faiths, but I’d imagine everyone has had a difficult time navigating the past 12-plus months in this area of life.
For now I worry about those who found that they don’t miss the connections of church gatherings or small groups. I feel for the kids in those families who might not get to return to services because their parents have grown disconnected over the last year.
We’re all trying to figure things out with this pandemic, even a year later. That goes for everyone including schools, businesses, clubs and especially churches. It also includes us as individuals.
Hopefully, however, for all the people who grew apart from religion recently, just as many, if not more, have found that they don’t want to do without common gatherings of believers. Hopefully for them, their patience will soon pay off and the good old days are right around the corner.