> We had a video conference last week to discuss opening our church for private
> prayer, but the variety of views on what constituted a decent standard of
> risk control was too great for me to consider volunteering for steward duties.
We reopened ours. However, we're implementing a whole slew of
recommended "best practices". For example, mask wearing is mandatory
indoors, except for those on the platform. We have a reduced capacity,
which is easy to enforce by rearrangement and reduction of seating.
Everything is cleaned between every service (we're running two on
Sunday Morning, one on Wednesday Night), and our children's programs
are currently shut down, so that filters out a lot of families that
would otherwise come, but don't want to sit together for 75 minutes.
Also, since over half of our congregation is military, there are many
that can't attend in person because of their social distancing
restrictions.
But we were already streaming our services online before Covid, and
we'd already been implementing "distance-church" things to better
extend ourselves to the military families that will move here or have
moved away. So, Covid just put into practice for another 1500 people
what we were already doing for 500. We definitely did step up our
on-line game, though. This will be my first Sunday in months that I'm
not either running sound or a camera as our production requirements
have doubled.
While we've largely "reopened" up here in Alaska, the restrictions are
pretty high as to how things are done. Obviously, face-masks are
required indoors at any retail establishment, as is distancing (as
much as can be enforced through design). All establishments have a
maximum reduced capacity and so on. There are always going to be the
"don't tell me what to do" types (on both sides of the political
spectrum), for the most part we are doing what we are supposed to do
without too much grief.
Anyway, back to the church, our methodology is working out great, and
the fact that we stream our services and have other means of
engagement, we've basically said that if you want to come and be with
us in the room, great. If not, great. Either way is fine and perfectly
acceptable. No guilt either way. However, this was already the culture
of our church, so it hasn't had a devastating impact.
"Common Sense" is still the best thing when it comes to reducing risk.
And looking at everybody with the expectation that they have Covid.
AK Schnozz
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