Wade's right. (You don't hear that too often, do you brother!)
The Missouri District has been great with their communication about covid responses and about ministry practices all around. The Kansas District has also done a great job. I am blessed (?) to be in KCMO so we pay attention to what happens in both MO and KS.
Having family and friends throughout the Southeastern District, their response has also been good and appropriate.
And I think this leads to a problem of a different stripe. So many of my church members have connections throughout the US. They'll send me emails with links to what the Northwest District is doing, what South Wisconsin, Pacific Southwest, Southern, Mid-South, NE, Atlantic, Central Illinois... They are all good and helpful. But they are not entirely applicable. The governor of WA and the governors of KS and MO are not all doing the same thing because they are not responding to the same situation.
My response to the emails is, "Thanks. I'll give it a look."
Information overload is the problem. Time to digest the information, reflect for a minute, and see how it applies is needed, not more information.
Well, I think all the districts that I have seen information for has been all very good and timely.
Jeremy
It's good to hear that approaches from the "governors" of each district are coming out, coming through, and remain specific to situation.
One of my peeves along the way is that we're talking about the "re-opening" of churches. We have not closed for a minute here in Brooklyn, in the center of the heart of corona death and infection. The Body of Christ remains the Body of Christ, nourished through word and prayer, contact and community, active in acts of love in our communities through essential workers, health care workers, and in caring for those who have gotten sick, need to remain home, and have lost loved ones. Been open. Remain open. Remain by grace wise to the folly of coming together in any sizeable group in person.
We were going to apply for one of the testing sites that are now possible at churches. And neighborhood parishioners contacted me to say, "Please don't." As they explained it, the sidewalks aren't wide enough, there is absolutely nowhere to park on these blocks, and the long lines would only tangle up essential workers moving to and fro with testees who may be infected, and create confusion. We need to stay safe. We need to get tested. But we can't be safe and get tested here in the middle of the block (which is where our church is, right in the middle of a residential block). What does this mean? The Body of Christ is open and discerning its ministry to one another and to its neighborhood.
Somebody says the churches need to pray now more than ever so open up. Hello? We have been praying all along, more fervently than ever, and the discernment in prayer has been NOT to come together in large groups.
Dave Benke
