A Christian Response to Coronavirus. Should Churches Close?
How Christians can still be the body of Christ during a quarantine.
Stories of a mysterious new virus originating in China had begun to trickle out, but not too many people in the United States were taking it seriously.
I wasn’t alarmed yet, either, but I was uneasy enough to refuse the offered handshakes of people sitting next to me in church. The following week, I emailed our minister and asked him to tell people to stop shaking hands during our church greeting time. If the suggestion came from the pulpit, maybe I wouldn’t seem so anti-social.
“We’re having staff meetings to try and decide on a way forward with this new virus issue,” the minister emailed back.
I wasn’t sure he would follow up on my suggestion, but the next Sunday, he asked parishioners to bump elbows in lieu of handshakes.
The whole handshake versus elbow bump issue became a moot point a week later because my church, along with most of the churches in our area, called off services until further notice. For the first time in my life, church had shut down.
Coronavirus was beginning to dominate the news, and people were asked to self-quarantine. Some people disagreed with the church closures. A few churches…
