When the coronavirus pandemic cut off Jessie Thompson, 67, from her Baptist church, she felt alone. She was used to spending several days a week volunteering, ministering, and worshipping alongside members of her community. But for months, she was unable to even attend a service in-person.
Instead of allowing the circumstances to push her from her faith, though, Thompson said she took the pandemic as an opportunity to lean into her faith even more. Joined by several members of her immediate family, Thompson set up a system in which every hour was filled with prayer. She and her husband took the 3 a.m. to 5 a.m. shift together.
“When life isn’t the way you expect it, you listen more attentively to what God is saying,” she told the Washington Post last year. “It’s a different closeness.”
Thompson’s experience is not unique. Religious people across America overwhelmingly agreed in a recent survey that the coronavirus outbreak has bolstered their faith and the faith of their loved ones. Nearly 3 in 10 people said their personal faith has become stronger because of the pandemic, and the same share believe that religious faith across the country is stronger now than it was last year, the Pew Research Center found.
For people of faith, these numbers shouldn’t come as a surprise. Religion is a comfort and a bedrock, especially during hardships. Indeed, almost every single religious group said their faith deepened as a result of the coronavirus. Among evangelicals, 42% said their faith grew; Catholics, 27%; black Protestants, 56%; and Jews, 7%.
“I feel like the disruption of the pandemic has made us live that in a deeper way,” said Chris Butler, the pastor of Pentecostal Embassy Church in Chicago. “We’re having communion on the livestream, where everyone just gets their own element, taco shells and grape soda or whatever, and let’s do it. It’s lifted us up into our mission.”
This temporary state of things, though, is not sustainable. A computer screen is no substitute for worshipping in person, and online fellowship cannot replace the joy that comes from gathering together. Faith is something that is meant to be shared, and if you keep believers from each other for long enough, their faith will begin to suffer.
“People thought we would be back,” said Terri Prokipik, a lay minister at the Church for the Nativity. “I’m seeing some people making comments: ‘I’m a bit spiritually wiped out. I’m not feeling well. I’m feeling a disconnect.’ For me, I miss the sacraments. I miss communion. That’s the hardest part.”
