Like retailers, universities and hospitals, churches will be having conversations around this question: Are buildings a necessity for delivering our services and ministries? In our new normal, physical location may be only one of many expressions of church.
Will our common vulnerabilities in this moment lead us to unite for the common good?
Perhaps this global pandemic will gather in each of us a calm assurance, having become so weary of our vices, we finally embrace our cure – by embracing one another.
The ‘tie that binds’: fellowship is disrupted and distanced, but not destroyed
Social distancing has disrupted our habits of work and worship. We can adapt, whether adeptly or awkwardly. We do not, however, have to let social distancing disrupt or destroy “the tie that binds” and “the fellowship of kindred minds.”
Earth Day’s 50th anniversary: eerie similarities between an environmental crisis and a global pandemic
We must begin NOW to create a “new normal,” refusing to go back to the world before COVID-19. Our experience of resurrection and death transformed into new life – even one with the scars of our woundedness – can guide and motivate us.
COVID-19: Now I understand King’s truth of the ‘inescapable web of mutuality’
Prophets have been saying this for millennia: Justice will not be guaranteed to me until we have built a culture ensuring justice for everyone. My own welfare can only be found in the welfare of my most vulnerable neighbor.
Our national curse: the cruel convergence of Trump’s presidency and the COVID-19 pandemic
Trump’s cruel suspension of U.S. support to the World Health Organization is not only fraudulent; it is a crime against humanity.
Scrounging for ‘what elements you have around you’ to share virtual Communion
We joined others at the Lord’s Table(s), a community scattered by a deadly pandemic but gathered, alone together, in homes across the city, sacralizing the common things of life by making holy the elements we had around us.
We’re prepared: a word of encouragement to my clergy colleagues and to those who love them
My clergy friends and other siblings in ministry, it is time for us to stop saying that we are not prepared for this moment of chaos and crisis. Hear me say: yes, we are.
Comparative vocabularies of pandemic and faith in a time of chaos
These comparative lists kept running through my mind – one describing our reaction to a spreading virus, the other reminding me of faith and joy, regardless of circumstances.