While much of the fo­cus has been on the im­pact of the pan­dem­ic on busi­ness­es, many re­li­gious in­sti­tu­tions have al­so been neg­a­tive­ly im­pact­ed as a re­sult of COVID-19.

East­er week­end may be the long week­end with many fam­i­lies plan­ning a va­ca­tion or lime, but for Chris­t­ian church­es it rep­re­sents the pe­ri­od where they reg­u­lar­ly record their high­est at­ten­dances and by ex­ten­sion re­ceive their largest do­na­tions.

 A year ago, the Cathe­dral was able to have an al­most full cel­e­bra­tion, but af­ter a mas­sive spike of in­fec­tions just weeks af­ter East­er, places of wor­ship were closed in April 2021.

Cur­rent­ly on­ly 50 per cent ca­pac­i­ty is al­lowed at church­es. That al­lowance was grant­ed in No­vem­ber, 2021. Places of wor­ship had on­ly been re­opened at 25 per cent in Sep­tem­ber.
Vic­ar for Com­mu­ni­ca­tions of the Catholic Arch­dio­cese, Fa­ther Robert Chris­to said the church was wait­ing to learn if this would change any time soon but for the mo­ment their fo­cus re­mained im­prov­ing on­line ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty for their mem­ber­ship.

“We have a hy­brid of both. So we are ob­vi­ous­ly stick­ing to the com­pli­ance of the Min­is­ter’s guide­lines. We have an HSE team of doc­tors, epi­demi­ol­o­gists, cler­gy and di­rec­tors who are look­ing at the guide­lines. So we are ad­her­ing to the guide­lines as we speak. And look­ing to  see what the gov­ern­ment will do and  what our lit­tle group will do al­so,” he said, “So every­thing is as is, we have hy­brid, vir­tu­al and then we have 50% at­ten­dance so we are stick­ing to what is giv­en to us. We can’t ex­pand any­more, though. We ex­pect more peo­ple to be maybe on­line and or at­tempt­ing to come in con­tact.”

How­ev­er with­out the ma­jor at­ten­dances nor­mal­ly seen for Christ­mas, New Year’s Day and oth­er ma­jor feasts on the cal­en­dar has meant the church’s cof­fers and abil­i­ty to main­tain it­self has tak­en a hit.

“Fi­nan­cial­ly it has af­fect­ed us sig­nif­i­cant­ly, be­cause it’s hard to bring mon­ey in. So we are man­ag­ing that but we had made some strate­gic (moves) and cre­ative ways in terms of deeds of covenant and or on­line do­na­tions. Those are trick­ling be­cause they’re a dif­fer­ent way of con­tribut­ing and or ac­count­ing. But we have not been to the point fi­nan­cial­ly where it would have been in per­son  but we do man­age that. It’s not as sig­nif­i­cant yet, but we have a team work­ing on how best to get the in­come to main­tain the op­er­a­tional mis­sion and the main­te­nance of the church,” he said.

“Most of our on­line plat­forms have op­tions to elec­tron­i­cal­ly de­posit. We have peo­ple giv­ing their tithing, peo­ple giv­ing the covenant so we have to kind of boost up those for when peo­ple don’t come in to give their week­ly you know.”

The im­prove­ment of the on­line in­ter­ac­tion be­tween the church and its con­gre­ga­tion has come in­to greater fo­cus as the church is aware the typ­i­cal days are not ex­pect­ed soon.

“So it’s a strate­gic de­ci­sion and a stance and a re­think­ing that is hap­pen­ing too. But we have not put too much em­pha­sis on this, at least me per­son­al­ly, yet. Oth­er than to try to bring peo­ple in­to a good hy­brid, you know, to the Sacra­men­tal and the wor­ship and the praise, you know, the spir­i­tu­al part. I fo­cus on that for now. More to get them in tune and or to come out and feel safe. Fi­nances, we will man­age that sep­a­rate­ly,” he said.

Fa­ther Chris­to added that at this time it was al­so in the best in­ter­est of not just the church but the wider pub­lic to en­sure that the reg­u­la­tions are fol­lowed by those who at­tend mass in per­son  
“We are mak­ing sure peo­ple who are here (know) com­pli­ance is sig­nif­i­cant at this time still. We are not let­ting down our guards at all even though peo­ple will be flood­ing for ash­es and or for re­treats or cru­sades. So, there are strict guide­lines to main­tain  com­pli­ance, main­tain the law, main­tain every­thing. So, I know we are re­view­ing it in­ter­nal­ly,” he said, adding that the church was al­so ap­ply­ing strict rules to its of­fi­ciants as well.

“We have put some mea­sures on like the choir, Eu­charis­tic min­is­ters and Dea­cons who ac­tu­al­ly par­tic­i­pate in the con­tact. We have strin­gent guide­lines for them. And as we move for­ward, I think some of the doc­tors and the cler­gy are re­view­ing that maybe. So that’s on­ly go­ing to come when they get feed­back on the gov­ern­ment, from the sci­ence and the HSE team,” he said,”But as of now, as we sit every­thing is as is, com­pli­ance you know, stick to the three W’s, have the con­duct trac­ing, tem­per­a­ture and the 50% main­te­nance of phys­i­cal but our on­line, we are boost­ing on­line to have the hy­brid more ac­ces­si­ble.”

Fa­ther Chris­to did recog­nise there had been an in­crease in the at­ten­dance at phys­i­cal mass­es, but there were still many vari­ables which kept the church from ex­pect­ing the nor­mal of the past to re-emerge.

“I think peo­ple are com­ing back out now since they have a lit­tle more con­fi­dence. We are see­ing pos­i­tive in­take and move­ment and mon­i­tor­ing it close­ly. And we re­al­ly have to make sure that the ones who vir­tu­al­ly got ac­cus­tomed have to kind of re­think how, de­pend­ing on if they are com­fort­able and el­i­gi­ble. And they are  vac­ci­nat­ed I guess,” he said, “and they will be more open to come out of their hous­es  to come back to church, which is high­ly sacra­men­tal. We be­lieve in com­mu­nion and we be­lieve in the Sacra­ments like Ash­es the re­ceiv­ing of ash­es.”

That un­known as­pect of the men­tal­i­ty of the pub­lic with re­gard to re­join­ing the mass con­gre­ga­tion with­in the church’s walls fur­ther un­der­lined the Church’s need for in­vest­ment in vir­tu­al and on­line, he said.
“It’s hy­brid one and two, peo­ple’s per­son­al choic­es and rights, and how they feel about the sit­u­a­tion. Just can’t push peo­ple and their own med­ical his­to­ry,” he said.
Chris­to how­ev­er called for Catholics who were fast­ing for the Lenten pe­ri­od, not to do so for self­ish rea­sons but to be mind­ful of those who are in need.

“You need to give up some­thing but be care­ful it’s not a self­ish needs on­ly. In your own spir­i­tu­al­i­ty, what­ev­er you give up, you must pick up some­thing that you gain from the giv­ing up and give it to the poor. For ex­am­ple, you give up some item, eat­ing, the mon­ey you save from that. and you must save, must be giv­en over for alms giv­ing. Or else it is of no use, you’re just stroking your spir­i­tu­al ego,” he said.