Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Christians Being Defiantly Normal
Our Church is very committed, very loving, very devoted to our co-parishioners. I was hoping that our pastor would find a way to have services on Sunday, and he did. We assembled in the parking lot, made a circle of cars and either sat in our cars or stood beside them. Thirty-three cars eventually joined our circle, thus about 50 parishioners.
Pastor Joe stood in the center and gave a wonderful sermon on “Living by Faith, not by Fear” based on II Corinthians 4:7-11.
We sang hymns, we made an offering, we prayed. It was a memorable spiritual event. Near the end, a patrol car entered the parking lot but we were not accosted; one of the deacons spoke to the officer, who told him that she had stopped not to break up the event, but to hear the word.
We are obliged by civil authorities to live in fear and isolation, but there are a thousand ways we can reach out, within and without our communities, and continue to be Christians, and families, and neighbors. Use a little imagination and others will come to mind.
The large building on the right is our Church. It was built in 1915 for a Christian Science congregation and now houses a small Baptist assembly.
I am proud of our pastor beyond words. May God bless us all.
Published in General
Our church prepared videoed worship songs on Wednesday night and one of the pastors videoed a sermon Thursday night at the podium as he would have done on a Sunday morning. Our wonderful AV technician put it all together and one of the members hosted a Facebook watch party at the normal service time. As members and friends joined the party we could greet one another and offer our amens and words of affirmation as Assemblies of God folk like to do. One of the co-hosts entered the words to the songs so that we could sing along. It was good to make this contact with brothers and sisters in the Lord and worship simultaneously even though physically apart. For those who could not make it at that time, they still had the capability of watching on the church website.
Love will find a way.
Wonderful. May the Lord bless you all abundantly.
I wish we could do the same but our bishop has asked there be no public gatherings of this nature here in NY.
I came up with a different solution — this past Wednesday my church had planned a Lenten Vespers service, with me cantoring, so I recorded the service at home and posted a video to YouTube, which was posted on our parish’s Facebook page, along with a link to the Vespers program.
Praise God as well for fossil fuels and the internet. They make our isolation so much less.
Our Texas church did a livestream of service yesterday with livechat and the Augsburg House of Prayer here in Germany has taken its livestream 24/7 since the general curfew was imposed last week.
I’m not a churchgoer, but I believe people need to meet and pray in trying times. These church bans by governors should be ignored at the church’s discretion . . .
In my hometown in East TN, several churches of various denominations got together and rented out the drive-in movie theater in town, and had a service there, with hundreds of people. Members of my church family that went said it was wonderful.
A church is not just a building.
Here’s a picture from the drive-in movie theater this weekend. I’ll see if I can find more.
Alas I think our parishes are too big. A small congregation can do this. I do appreciate all the priests, musicians, etc who are putting things online including you.
My daughters and I got to watch their college town church service streaming online, and then we watched our own church’s service, which had been recorded the day before in the pastor’s office with four other people crammed in there to provide the music. The program was added as an attachment and included sermon notes. They try to stream their service every Sunday, for those who can’t attend, but this particular Sunday it was really important.
I hope you snagged some heathen cinephiles by accident.
In East TN, a heathen is someone who occasionally skips Wednesday night services…
Catholics obey their bishops, and bishops heed the pope. So there will be little defiance in the form of public Mass. But individual parishes have instituted many changes, from 24/7 adoration of God in the tabernacle to online Mass participation to various Bible studies and prayer groups on- and offline.
Remember that your pastors and church programs rely on regular local funding. If you normally tithe at Sunday service, find out how else you can relay your aid.
Our parish has already had to furlough three staff members. The money started drying up even the week before the ban, when many parishioners voluntarily secluded themselves.
Thank you for posting this. Those pictures did wonders for me.
I saw a story about a local church doing the same parking-lot routine. Great idea.