Church in the Time of COVID-19: Findings From a National Survey (Part 2)
This is the second in a series of articles exploring the results of a national survey of 1,449 church attenders. In part one I shared the responses to a series of questions about attenders’ thoughts on returning to corporate worship and in-person small groups. In this article, I’ll share what churches have been doing to continue ministering to their congregants.
The following table shows what respondents’ churches were doing before the pandemic and what they began doing as a result of the pandemic (click the table to enlarge it).
The key takeaways are that most respondents attend a church that is now live streaming their weekend service. Prior to the pandemic, about a quarter of congregations utilized none of these strategies; now, that percentage has dropped to 9.2%.
I’m interested in the 9.2% of congregations that utilize none of these strategies: who are they and what, if anything, do they have in common? Well, the data from this survey show they are smaller and more likely to be Roman Catholic. About half (47%) of these congregations have fewer than 50 regular attendees, and about 35% are Roman Catholic.
Respondents who attend a congregation that does not use any of these connection strategies are less likely to agree or strongly agree with the statement, “My congregation has done an excellent job of connecting with and encouraging members over the past few weeks respondents” (69% as compared to 28.4%).
Anecdotal evidence suggests that Zoom services or other services that are more interactive would provide members with something different than live streaming. However, there are no significant differences in responses to the 10 primary questions asked in this survey based on Zoom only or live stream only.
Overall, you can see that many congregations branched out with new uses of technology to deal with COVID-19, and in some separate surveys of individual congregations that I conducted, many participants said that they wanted to see their congregation continue to live stream services or provide other ways for members to connect virtually.
Technology has been an integral part of staying connected during these difficult times. In my next article, I’ll explore which characteristics create the greatest distinctions in anxiety – characteristics such as geographic region, having someone high risk in your household, gender, work status, and marital status.
Related Resources
Intersection video or audio: “Congregational Response to COVID-19”
Summer Seminar video: “Impact of COVID-19 on Churches” (also featuring Renee Paul)
