Church: Physical, Virtual, Aboriginal, Spiritual – Theological Options

During the pandemic, we’ve become sued to online church. Virtual gatherings, one-to-one conversations, and pastoral care, replaced ion-person physical encounters. In some cases, these were enrichments, enabling, for example, people to attend Life-Groups, who had never been able to come physically: e.g. single parents, shift-workers. 

Discovering a Different Church

Church is different. Today, we had our first service after lockdown. Numbers were limited, to comply with social distancing regulations, we all wore masks, and there was no singing – a real sadness for a multiracial, urban, charismatic and Baptist, congregation, used to singing their heads off on Sunday mornings, in praise to our King! 

Back to Life. Back to Virtuality.

I was woken up at 4am last night, by a party outside our house. The relaxation of lockdown is bringing people out into the streets and parks. Recently, several beaches were crowded by hordes of holidaymakers, completely ignoring social distancing. And pubs overflow their seating on our pavements. That it is mainly the young doing this reflects the state of their hormones, and their innate desire to mix and mingle. It also instantiates Mikhail Bahktin’s concept of the “carnivalesue”: that people occasionally need to let rip.

The Dangers of Digital

Imagine if Covid had happened pre-internet. We have maintained relationships and connection through video calls and social media. Without them, the isolation could have been much worse. Church too has flourished through virtualisation. Small prayer groups and Bible studies occur via video calls. Church services are also shared through this clunky means, or through pre-recorded, heavily-edited productions, on social media, which demand intensive volunteer labour.