From The Editor

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BY October, the Church is generally well into the swing of a new church year. This year as the seasons and colours change and as we head in to cooler weather there is the risk of a resurgence of Covid-19 as it thrives in cooler temperatures. This means Church life will continue to be different for some time – and may change again if the global pandemic threatens to overwhelm our communities again until a safe vaccine is created.

But this year has seen the emergence of creativity – not just among ministers but among congregations as they have paused and listened for the still silent voice which leads us all.

No two parishes are the same and the response to the strict lockdown created by a global pandemic has been different in every parish. For some the solution lay in harnessing new online technologies and creating a new digital church. For others, the response was more practical – ensuring the most vulnerable were not forgotten and that basic needs were being met through simple acts of love and kindness. For others it was a combination of both.

As we have moved through the summer, moving through different phases of lockdown, the responses have been equally diverse, but the emphasis at all times has been on safety and care for not just the people of our Church but for our wider communities.

Initial restrictions meant some churches were reluctant to open only for ‘private prayer’ and to be perceived as unwelcoming whilst necessarily strict rules and regulations were in place for the protection of all, balanced with the health and age of the volunteers who would implement the new measures.

The emphasis at all times has been on safety and care for not just the people of our Church but for our wider communities.

Slowly, depending on their setting, community and the resources at their fingertips, churches have re-emerged, not battered, but strengthened by the experience of this year.

Lockdown also offered the gift of time amid the isolation. Many rediscovered hobbies and pastimes which had simply been unthinkable because the time did not exist. There was also the rediscovery of time to sit and simply ‘be’ and consider individual spirituality and conversations with God.

The creative responses to remaining communities of faith rooted in God have strengthened and helped not just congregations, but presbyteries and the central church forge new paths and new more streamlined and effective ways of working.

There is still much to be done – and the threat of the pandemic will remain with us over the winter and into 2021, but a crisis which threatened initially to engulf and overwhelm has helped reshape our Church and also unleashed newfound creativity and potential.

This article appears in the October 2020 Issue of Life and Work

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