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Plug-In: Amid Tennessee tornado wreckage, one man's faith offers a huge measure of hope

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COOKEVILLE, Tenn. — Heartbreak and hope.

It’s a combination I’ve witnessed repeatedly when covering catastrophes, from the Oklahoma City bombing to Hurricane Katrina to, most recently, the March 3 Tennessee tornadoes that killed 25 people and injured hundreds.

In a ravaged neighborhood of this community 80 miles east of Nashville, I met a survivor slammed into his basement by the EF-4 twister that destroyed his home.

But rather than lament what he had lost, the man, Gary Flatt, thanked God for fellow Christians who had come to his aid.

“Someone looked at the house and said, ‘It’s unbelievable what a tornado can do,’” Flatt told me, standing amid the scattered debris. “And I told them, ‘No, it’s unbelievable what a bunch of loving Christians can do.’”

Yes, it’s true: People of faith do more than pray after a disaster such as this.

Here’s how religion writer Holly Meyer of The Tennessean described the religious community’s response to the tornadoes:

They transformed their houses of worship into de facto relief centers, organized droves of volunteers for cleanup, raised money and met the basic needs of storm survivors.

These belief-driven helpers have been at it for days.

In 2018, I enjoyed writing a feature (“18 wheels and a heart to serve”) about a faith-based disaster relief truck driver’s all-night drive from Nashville, Tenn., to Panama City, Fla., after Hurricane Michael.

The theme: Heartbreak and hope.


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Thinking about faith during a plague: Input from Singapore on dealing with coronavirus crisis

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This is not a normal Sunday morning — anywhere.

I’m typing this after spending the morning doing something I have never done before — watching an Internet live stream of the the Divine Liturgy of my home parish, St. Anne Orthodox Church in Oak Ridge, Tenn. I am, to be blunt, an at-risk individual since I am (a) 60something, (b) someone with asthma and chronic sinus issues and (c) someone who had a sore throat and low fever six days ago (both gone).

But I was not the only person who was not present in the service. Under the extraordinary (and I believe very wise) instructions of our Archbishop Alexander of Dallas and the Diocese of the South the rite was being celebrated by our clergy and a few chanters — while everyone else stayed home as a form of “social distancing.” Priests will take the Sacraments to the sick and hospitalized as needed, of course.

Our archbishop’s instructions (.pdf document here) represented a crisp, clear statement of one of the major COVID-19 news stories taking place in our world, this morning. In part, he wrote:

Everyone in the parish or mission, other than the priest (and deacon), a reader, a server, and no more than two (2) chanters or singers (all of whom are physically strong and at low risk for COVID-19), should remain at home, even at the time of the Divine Liturgy. The holy body and precious blood of our Lord can never be a source of disease, it is after all for the healing of soul and body, but the COVID-19 virus can still be passed through the congregation. Out of love for our neighbor, we must do everything we can to protect the vulnerable by slowing the rate of infection not only in our parishes, but in the greater community, and thereby allowing the hospitals and medical community to more adequately care for those most at risk. All who are “at risk” — the elderly, those with pre-existing conditions, any who are actively sick or exhibiting signs of illness — should absolutely absent themselves from the services. ...

If possible, the service should be webcast on the internet so that the faithful may participate in the prayers, which are themselves a source of grace and consolation.

The liturgy was followed by special prayers in our ancient tradition, the Molieben in Times of Pestilence. When it comes to plagues and disasters, ancient faiths offer ancient rites — because the faithful have been through all of this many times before.

This leads me to this weekend’s think piece, an essay by Edric Sng that ran on March 11 (that seems like an eternity ago) at Christianity Today.


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What’s happening to the religious makeup of the world (including in locked-up China)?

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What’s happening to the religious makeup of the world (including in locked-up China)?

THE QUESTION:

What are the long-term trends for the world’s religions? What’s the situation in China?

THE RELIGION GUY’S ANSWER:

Broad-brush, Christianity remains the world’s largest and most widespread religion and will still be so in 2050 thanks to steady growth in “Global South” nations of Africa, Asia and Latin America. However, Islam is steadily gaining ground.

Declines relative to the population have been suffered by folk religions in China, tribal traditions elsewhere, and the ranks of the non-religious. In 1800, Christianity and Islam together represented a third of the world population but these outreach-oriented faiths will encompass a projected 64 percent by 2050.

All that and much more is reported in the newly published third edition of the"World Christian Encyclopedia" (Edinburgh University Press, 998 pages, $215.95), compiled by the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, an evangelical Protestant school in Massachusetts. It was edited by the center’s Todd Johnson and Gina Zurlo, who led a team of 40 along with hundreds of expert consultants across the globe.

The encyclopedia contains unique statistics and analysis on each religious group that exists within each of the world’s 234 nations and territories, with elaborate information on cultural groupings and 45,000 Christian denominations. Quite obviously, this monumental reference work belongs in every serious library in the English-speaking world.

Here are the estimates comparing major religions’ size as of 1970 with their current numbers.


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New podcast: Autism and Holy Communion -- Like it or not, doctrine is part of this story

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This was the rare week in which my national “On Religion” column for the Universal syndicate grew directly out of a recent GetReligion post, the one with this headline: “Autism and Communion: Textbook social-media clash between parents, press and church.” The syndicated column then provided the hook for this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in).

That’s a lot of material to take in. Why did I think that this issue was worthy of all that attention?

Basically, it was a four-step process and I have to admit that I had a personal reason for taking this on.

(1) Let’s start with the USA Today story, which ran with this headline: “Boy with autism denied First Communion at Catholic church: 'That is discrimination,' mom says.”

That story offered a classic news-coverage clash between “discrimination” language that is so popular with journalists and the efforts of church leaders to, perhaps imperfectly, minister to people with special needs while also honoring 2,000 years of Catholic doctrine about Holy Communion.

(2) Doctrine vs. discrimination? What could go wrong? This USA Today piece was a classic example of a larger issue that your GetReligionistas have encountered over and over during the past 17 years.

Simply stated, journalists (especially reporters without religion-beat experience) have a tendency to frame religion news in images and language drawn from political conflicts. Who needs to dig into the details of Catholic tradition and canon law — including statements about Holy Communion and people with autism — when you can write a headline that shouts “Discrimination!”

Once again, there’s that doctrine found in way too many newsrooms: The world of politics is real. Faith and doctrine? Not so much.


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Ryan Burge on unique coronavirus fears in pews of America's aging 'mainline' churches

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Anyone who has worked in a newsroom knows that journalists often have to study the equation 1+1+X=3 and then find the missing X factor that produces “what comes next.”

What am I talking about? Journalists look at one set of facts in the news. Then they study another set of facts that we tend to take for granted or that we have pushed onto the news back burner. When you pay attention to where the two sets of facts overlap — #BOOM — you can see potential headlines.

Right now, the coronavirus crisis is creating all kinds of overlapping sets of facts and many are life-and-death matters. This is shaping the headlines and this trend will only increase.

However, after all of the COVID-19 stories I’ve read in the past week (while 66-year-old me has faced my usual spring sinus woes), none has hit me harder than a Religion News Service essay — “Why mainline Protestants might fear COVID-19 the most” — by political scientist Ryan Burge (also a contributor here at GetReligion). It’s crucial that he is also the Rev. Ryan Burge. He teaches at Eastern Illinois University, but he also a minister in the American Baptist Churches USA. Here is the overture:

I walked through the doors of First Baptist Church of Mount Vernon, Illinois, a congregation that I’ve pastored for the last 13 years, and shook hands with the 91-year-old greeter. Afterward, she said to me, “I didn’t know if we should shake hands today.”

I hadn’t even thought about it, but I know that she had.

COVID-19 has now infected more than 100,000 people, killing 4,000 of them across the globe. But, one of the real curiosities is that the mortality rate is dramatically different based on age. The disease takes the life of nearly 15% of the people that it infects over the age of 80.

I find that to be incredibly cruel, especially for my mainline church that has been dwindling in size and increasing in age at a stunning rate. Of our 20 or so active members, four of them are over the age of 90. Another 10 are in their 80s. If COVID-19 becomes a true global pandemic, my church would likely not fare well.


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Farewell to a familiar news story angle? Argentina shows that pope's policy clout is fading

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Past popes have exerted an enormous amount of influence on politics around the world. A pope’s influential reach — and the large number of Catholics around the world — has often been vital in the shaping of laws and policy.

The best example is Saint Pope John Paul II. The Polish-born pontiff was instrumental in the fall of communism some three decades ago. His successor, Pope Benedict XVI, had a different approach. Not a media star like JPII, Benedict focused his efforts on Africa. With help from humanitarian aid organizations, the Vatican exerted a great amount of influence in many African nations where the church matters. The church continues to grow there.

This has helped shape how journalists cover the papacy and, thus, the Catholicism. Shaping world politics? That’s news. Shaping doctrines and how people worship? That’s news— maybe. It depends. Do the doctrines have anything to do with gender or sex?

This brings us to Pope Francis.

A progressive star to some, Francis has made immigration and climate change the cornerstones of his foreign policy priorities. Although he is considered a man of great influence, his papacy has also coincided with the rise of both secularism and populism. That has given the Vatican strange bedfellows on some issues — like aligning itself with left-wing parties in Italy. His initiatives have been ineffective with others.

Francis’ papacy — aside from dividing Catholics, predominantly in the United States — has been a disappointment on a great many issues. While the pope’s position is within traditional Catholic teaching (on climate change and immigration), it has polarized many and been widely dismissed by the same populist governments that have also been appealing to doctrinally conservative-minded voters. Francis is not a forceful diplomat like John Paul II nor a prominent theologian like Benedict.

In terms of his strengths, Francis is seen as both humble and simple — traits that don’t get the job done when it comes to international diplomacy.


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Did I shake hands with the rector? COVID-19 hits a highly symbolic altar inside DC Beltway

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I know, I know. I couldn’t believe it either.

In terms of shock value in the Twitter-verse, the Washington Post team buried the lede in a timely news piece that ran with this headline: “For Georgetown churchgoers, a coronavirus self-quarantine is embraced as necessary.”

This is an Inside. The. Beltway. Story and I am perfectly OK with that. So see if you can spot the shocking symbolic detail in this overture:

The longtime friends were looking forward to their regular game of bridge at Washington’s posh Metropolitan Club on Monday afternoon, a bit of welcome routine in a world slowly spinning out of control.

The three prominent lawyers, C. Boyden Gray, William Nitze and Edwin D. Williamson, were well aware that the novel coronavirus was spreading, and that it had just made an appearance in Maryland with the announcement of the state’s first three cases last week. They never imagined, however, that the District’s first confirmed case of covid-19 would arrive at their doorstep: the 203-year-old Christ Church Georgetown, an affluent Episcopal congregation co-founded by Francis Scott Key and attended by a bipartisan collection of well-known Washingtonians, among them Fox News host Tucker Carlson.

You can just hear the gasps from readers across America who do not understand the role that Georgetown plays in the DC political ecosphere.

Yes, Tucker Carlson and his family attend an Episcopal parish. If I remember correctly, they have been members of this parish for quite some time.

It’s a Washington thing. Lambs and lions (who is who depends on the biases of the observer) may occupy the same pews. It’s all about location, location, location. And as any editor inside the Beltway will tell you, the Episcopal Church retains its clout, serving as a kind of “NPR at prayer” (a label created by my Orthodox priest, a former Episcopal tall-steeple clergyman).


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Hot tip: Here's almost everything you ever wanted to know about every religion everywhere

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The third edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia, just published, boasts accurately of being “the most comprehensive attempt to quantify adherents of Christianity and other world religions.”

The 998 pages are packed not only with such statistics but overview articles and then descriptions about every religion and 45,000 denominations of Christianity as found within each of the world’s 234 nations and territories. This monumental project is the work of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

Yes, this is a missionary-minded evangelical Protestant school, but the center's research is widely acknowledged as objective and authoritative. (The center planned a related conference on world religions March 30-April 1 that looks interesting and has just postponed it until September due to The Virus.)

The 40-member encyclopedia team drew upon the 1982 and 2001 editions in a 50-year project now led by the center’s Todd Johnson and Gina Zurlo. The latter is also a fellow at Boston University’s Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs. Zurlo (gzurlo@gordonconwell.edu) can help media reviewers obtain access to a full electronic text of the encyclopedia on a “personal use only” basis.

This volume obviously belongs in any serious library, including those at media companies, despite the $215.95 price.

More immediately, there are breaking news articles here for the taking that will be enhanced by maps, charts and graphs by your art department. Here’s a sampling of research findings.

* The encyclopedia’s major theme is that “Global South” nations are the population center of Christianity after long dominance by Europe and North America. Veteran religion writers are generally aware of this shift, but consider the particulars.


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During times of panic and plague, priests take risks to do the work they are called to do

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During times of panic and plague, priests take risks to do the work they are called to do

The second wave of influenza in the fall of 1918 was the worst yet and, by the time Father Nicola Yanney reached Wichita, Kansas, a citywide quarantine was in effect.

A 16-year-old girl had already died, creating a sense of panic. The missionary priest -- his territory reached from Missouri to Colorado and from Oklahoma to North Dakota -- couldn't even hold her funeral in the city's new Orthodox sanctuary. As he traveled back to his home church in Kearney, Neb., he kept anointing the sick, hearing confessions and taking Holy Communion to those stricken by the infamous "Spanish flu."

After days of door-to-door ministry in the snow, Yanney collapsed and called his sons to his bedside. Struggling to breathe, he whispered: "Keep your hands and your heart clean." He was one of an estimated 50 million victims worldwide.

A century later, many Orthodox Christians in America -- especially those of Syrian and Lebanese descent -- believe Yanney should be recognized as a saint. And now, as churches face fears unleashed by the coronavirus, many details of his final days of his ministry are highly symbolic.

"Father Nicola got the flu because he insisted on ministering to people who had the flu," said Father Andrew Stephen Damick, creator of "The Equal of Martyrdom," an audio documentary about the man known as "The Apostle to the Plains."

"For priests, there are risks. But you cannot turn away when people are suffering and they need the sacraments of the church. You go to your people and minister to them. This is what priests do."

Few acts in ministry are as intimate as a priest huddled with a seriously ill believer, hearing what could be his or her final confession of sins.


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