(RNS) — Most American church buildings navigated the patchwork of COVID-19 restrictions on public gatherings by periodically closing their doorways and broadcasting providers on-line as an alternative.
However for nearly half of U.S. Orthodox Christians, whose liturgy entails processions, incense, kissing icons and crosses and receiving Communion from a shared spoon and chalice, liturgical providers continued for anybody eager to attend in individual, in response to a brand new examine of how the denomination weathered the pandemic.
The brand new examine finds that Orthodox church buildings total had been reluctant to embrace digital worship in comparison with all spiritual congregations. By spring 2023, 75% of all U.S. congregations supplied distant choices in comparison with solely 53% of Orthodox church buildings.
Fewer on-line choices seemingly contributed to the numerous drop in Orthodox church participation in the midst of the pandemic in 2021, however in comparison with different U.S. congregations which can be on common 8% beneath pre-COVID-19 attendance, Orthodox church buildings had recovered in-person attendance on common by spring 2023.
On the identical time, Orthodox church buildings total have seen a drop in volunteer participation, from 40% in 2020 to 25% in 2023, in comparison with 40% and 35% in all U.S. congregations.
The Orthodox tendency to “ignore” the pandemic has produced a “combined bag,” stated analysis launched Thursday (Aug. 22) by the Hartford Institute for Faith Analysis and Alexei Krindatch, nationwide coordinator of the U.S. Census of Orthodox Christian Church buildings. Orthodox church buildings within the U.S. are extra seemingly than different spiritual congregations to have gained members throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, even whereas battling declines in participation and volunteering.
“In comparison with Different U.S. Spiritual Congregations, Orthodox Christian Parishes Had been Extra More likely to “Ignore” the Pandemic” (Graphic courtesy HIRR)
Utilizing survey knowledge from 2020 by means of 2023, the examine discovered 44% of Orthodox church buildings remained open throughout the pandemic, in comparison with simply 12% of all U.S. congregations. Solely 31% of Orthodox monks publicly inspired parishioners to get vaccinated in comparison with 62% of all clergy.
“They had been attempting to keep away from conflicts,” stated Krindatch, the examine’s lead researcher, who has printed earlier experiences on how the pandemic impacted Orthodox Christians.
There isn’t a single Orthodox Church within the U.S. As an alternative, a number of jurisdictions — the biggest are the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, the Orthodox Church in America and the Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese — are administered independently of each other and exist facet by facet, sharing the identical teachings and in full communion with each other. Many Orthodox parishes mix a number of immigrant teams and their descendants, from Russians and Ukrainians to Arabs and Greeks, in addition to converts from different faiths and denominations.
Bishops supplied pandemic steering to the monks serving them, corresponding to whether or not to require masking or not, typically throughout a swath of states that clashed on masking and lockdown mandates. Monks then selected whether or not and find out how to observe or adapt that steering to their particular circumstances, generally casting doubt on the bishop’s authority.
“I figured persons are going to make their very own medical selections (in regards to the vaccine),” stated one Orthodox priest who participated within the survey, the Rev. Lawrence Margitich of St. Seraphim of Sarov Cathedral in Santa Rosa, California, a parish of the Orthodox Church of America. “I’m the priest. What do I learn about that stuff?”
Margitich stated his church has grown from about 80 individuals on a Sunday morning within the pre-pandemic months of 2020 to about 180 individuals at the moment. To scale back the unfold of the coronavirus, in 2020, the church moved providers to its out of doors courtyard with an amplified sound system. Then in August 2020, smoke from a significant wildfire pushed them again inside.
Throughout that double disaster, during which tons of of native houses burned to the bottom, individuals started exhibiting as much as St. Seraphim.
“They began pondering extra about everlasting realities, I suppose, and their life on this world,” stated Margitich.
In line with a number of Orthodox clergy who’ve spoken to RNS, the pandemic lockdowns supplied extra time at house to browse the Web and self-reflect, main many non secular seekers to return throughout Orthodoxy for the primary time throughout a proliferation of English-language assets on-line after which go to a neighborhood church.
This 12 months, St. Seraphim of Sarov Cathedral has skilled extra baptisms than ever earlier than in Margitich’s 27-year profession, he stated, with 20 individuals catechized within the spring and 20 extra within the strategy of conversion.
The Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Washington, D.C. (RNS photograph/Mary Gladstone)
An earlier report by Krindatch concluded that whereas most Orthodox church buildings within the U.S. shrank a mean of 15% in common attendees from 2020 to 2022, 1 in 5 parishes as an alternative grew their membership and in-person attendance by 20%. The rising parishes are typically those who not solely remained open for in-person worship throughout the pandemic, but additionally didn’t provide on-line worship, have the next proportion of converts and have higher unity of opinions, amongst different elements.
By spring 2023, 15% of the members of a median Orthodox parish had been newcomers who had joined for the reason that begin of the pandemic in 2020, in comparison with solely 10% amongst different U.S. spiritual congregations, the most recent examine confirmed.
“It’s a statistically vital distinction,” Krindatch stated. “However there are larger variations between Orthodox jurisdictions. Folks had been undoubtedly in search of anywhere they may be a part of.”
The Russian Orthodox Church Outdoors Russia, generally known as ROCOR and thought of probably the most conservative jurisdiction, picked up considerably extra members than the Orthodox Church of America, which in flip picked up greater than the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, in response to Krindatch’s knowledge.
The Rev. Luke Veronis of Sts. Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church in Webster, Massachusetts, close to the Connecticut border, known as the pandemic a “optimistic” expertise for his parish, regardless of describing his congregation as “extraordinarily divided” politically, with each progressives and Donald Trump loyalists, who he refers to as “a household.” The COVID-19 restrictions pushed the church to livestream providers and meet on Zoom, alternate options they’ve continued to supply for liturgies and Bible research alongside the in-person gatherings.
Veronis’ church additionally skilled atypical progress, from 150 common month-to-month attendees in 2019 to about 220 at the moment, he stated. Most joined throughout the pandemic and are younger adults below age of 35. Most of the Greek Orthodox church buildings in New England are both declining or struggling to stay open, whereas solely a handful are rising.
“The important thing to our success is we’ve created a really welcoming church,” stated Veronis, who additionally teaches a category about cultivating “missions-minded” parishes at Hellenic Faculty and Holy Cross Orthodox Faculty of Theology in Brookline, Massachusetts. “I all the time preach to my individuals, our church welcomes all people … however then, after all, the problem for everyone is when you come into the church, all of us are on a journey of change and transformation. So don’t come along with your agendas.”
He calls the surge in membership some church buildings are experiencing “each a blessing and a curse.”
“One of many actual challenges we within the Orthodox Church are going to have is we have now lots of people coming into our church now, particularly younger males,” he stated. Whereas expressing gratitude for the lads who’ve discovered his parish, he added, “I’d be afraid if a few of these males went to another Orthodox church buildings, the place the monks themselves have given in to those ideological wars and these monks would simply feed into what these males are already in search of, the right-wing, excessive craziness.”
The examine is a part of a nationwide mixed-methods challenge titled Exploring the Pandemic Influence on Congregations and funded by the Lily Endowment that’s investigating modifications to congregational life ensuing from COVID-19. Religion Communities At present supplied 2020 survey knowledge of over 15,000 congregations on the pre-pandemic congregational panorama.
The subsequent survey in November 2024 will observe up on lots of the identical themes to look at how the pandemic’s impacts proceed to vary how congregations function and accumulate views from not simply clergy but additionally lay individuals.
