By Reinder Bruinsma
Only months ago, the first reports from China about the emergence of a new coronavirus—COVID-19—were beginning to circulate in the Western world. Since then, the deadly virus has infected millions of people and killed hundreds of thousands of men and women. And for the Southern hemisphere, the worst is probably yet to come.
As I write this short article, the daily news is dominated by this global crisis. Yes, the wars in Yemen and in Syria are continuing to exact their terrible toll, and the refugees continue to crowd the camps on the Greek island of Lesbos and other places. And yes, from time to time there are still some news snippets from North Korea. But these things have been completely overshadowed by the continuous stream of coronavirus news. Even the topic of climate change is on the back burner. Brexit talks will, presumably, continue, but it is also rather quiet on that front.
As the world is in fear, not knowing for how long the present pandemic will bring death and despair, people also are beginning to wonder what kind of long-term impact this crisis may have. Will it profoundly affect, also in the long term, the way we live, work and communicate? Will it change the political panorama? Will the crisis contribute to a further decline of the United States as the world’s number one superpower? Will China’s prestige and worldwide influence increase? Will the crisis permanently damage the European project?
What about the church?
Looking at a possible impact of the COVID-19 crisis on the Christian Church in general, one must conclude that there are many questions and, so far, very few answers. Will it lead many people to give more thought to questions about the meaning of life? Will it strengthen the trust of those who believe in God that, somehow, He still is in control? Will it lead believers to focus less on the doctrinal nitty-gritty of their faith and more on what it means to have a living faith in times of need? Or will it also cause many people to doubt and to ask the questions about how the current misery can be explained if, indeed, God is characterized by love?
There are also other aspects. Will denominations find it easier to work together and will this have a long-term impact on ecumenical endeavors? Will “higher” church organizations become more marginal when it appears that, when push comes to shove, the local congregations must largely depend on their own creativity and internal resources to ensure that the believers have a sense of continued community? In addition, one may wonder whether people may get so used to on-line church services that future church attendance may not reflect the pre-pandemic levels.
What about the Adventist Church?
Many of the same questions arise when we ponder what this pandemic will do for the Seventh-day Adventist Church. There is, at present, no way of imagining how the Adventist Church in the non-Western world where the bulk of the nineteen million-plus members of the church live, will be affected. I will, in what follows, focus on the Western world.
There are various reasons why in recent decades the hierarchical structure of the Adventist Church has weakened. For many members in the West, the higher organizations in our church have increasingly become further and further removed from actual life in the local church. The bitter controversy about the role of female pastors has not endeared a major segment of the church to the leaders of the higher organizations. And, although a segment of the membership applauds the more conservative approach of the top leadership of the church in recent years, it would seem that— at least in many places—the higher organizations (in particular the General Conference and the divisions) are regarded by many as less and less relevant. Will a period without any physical presence of the leaders of these higher organizations around their divisions and around the world field, due to the ban on international travel, and the cancelling of numerous international meetings, further strengthen this already ongoing process? Moreover, will the inevitable strain on the denominational finances be another aspect that feeds into this process?
Will the pandemic affect the theology of the Adventist Church? Theology is not something that happens in a vacuum, but is always, whether we recognize it or not, influenced by the historical and cultural context in which it develops. In times of crisis, Adventist eschatology is inescapably strongly affected. How does what we now experience fit into the Adventist end-time scenario?
As might be expected, various responses to this question highlight the deep polarization in the church’s thinking. As always, there are pockets in the Adventist Church (as there are in other conservative Christian communities) where all kinds of conspiracy theories flourish. Some suggest that the current pandemic ties in with the seven last plagues of Revelation 16. There are stern warnings on how the measures taken by governments all over the world demonstrate how quickly a situation may arise in which our liberties—including religious liberty—may be in serious jeopardy. They warn the members that the current crisis may well be a prelude to the establishment of some kind of repressive world government with, of course, the pope in a sinister key role. This will bring enforced Sunday worship and serious restrictions in commercial activities for the “faithful remnant.”
On the other hand, we hear the warning that we should be careful in giving an immediate prophetic interpretation to what is currently happening. After all, we have been wrong before when we did this. This pandemic, it is argued, may well be one of the many “signs” of the times, but we must refrain from alarmist predictions.
A positive development could well be that many church members want the church and its leaders to focus on what is, they feel, truly important in such a time as this. They do not look for Bible studies about the King of the North and the King of the South while thousands are dying of this terrible virus. They want to hear (and to share with others) a message of hope and encouragement, and do not worry about doctrinal fine print.
The local church is being greatly affected by the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. Keeping the church going and providing a meaningful service to its members demands a lot of local creativity from the pastors and many others. People with digital skills now play an even more important role than they already did. Communication with members and setting up a good system to keep them in- formed about the concrete needs of all members, is a sine qua non. Hopefully, significant inspiration will continue to come from the various organizational levels (in particular from the conferences and/or unions), but most inspiration will have to come from the local church. The “lock-down” of church buildings may not just be a matter of a few weeks but, in some places, of several months, and will demand a continuous stream of new ideas and new digital projects, for all age groups.
Some pastors are computer-savvy, but many, especially in the older age bracket, are not, or not enough, digitally knowledgeable to operate effectively in the current crisis. Here conferences and unions have a task to provide online education to help their pastors function optimally as long as physical contacts are severely restricted.
Another significant aspect is church attendance. Will many perhaps become so accustomed to listening to a sermon from their couch that this will become their preferred way of “going” to church? Will people have the tendency to tune in to the on-line service of their local church, or will many search for well-known speakers and tune in to the state-of-the-art on-line programs of big churches, rather than to the less sophisticated programs of their own, much smaller, local church?
And what about the finances? To what extent will the giving patterns of tithes and other offerings suffer under the present conditions? How will this effect mission projects— far away and nearby?
Can we expect some positive effects?
As I said in the opening paragraph, I have many questions for which I do not even have the beginning of an answer. However, asking these questions alerts us to things that we must carefully analyze as the Corona-crisis continues to exact its toll before it will, as we all hope, abate and disappear. It is important that the church, at all levels, will not simply go back to its earlier routines (if that is even possible!), but will take time to analyze what has happened and how we can learn from it.
What currently happens may, I believe, also have some positive outcomes. One example of this is the re-thinking of future world congresses of the church. The postponement of the 2020 General Conference session, which was to be held in early July of this year, has forced the church leadership to consider ways of re-shaping this quinquennial event, that over time has mushroomed exponentially, involving ever more people and requiring ever larger budgets—with no end in sight. The good news is that this unforeseen development has also prompted the decision to greatly simplify future world congresses.
The necessity to avoid travel and to cancel a wide array of international gatherings, symposia, consultations and committee meetings, may set a new trend in motion to make a much greater use of available technology and, thereby, save a great deal of time and money. Anyway, financial concerns may also force the church to move in that direction.
–Reinder Bruinsma