‘God is faithful, even when there is coronavirus’: Idahoans find faith connection online
More than once during Holy Week, Father Adrian Vazquez found himself completing a new ritual.
Usually — especially during the last days of Lent and the week of Easter — parishioners flood St. Jerome Catholic Church’s English and Spanish services. But the coronavirus pandemic’s arrival in Idaho had effectively scattered the faithful, as they sheltered at home with family or continued working essential jobs in dairies or food processing plants. It has left the normally bustling church in Jerome empty.
With in-person masses canceled, Vazquez joined other pastors, priests and religious leaders across the country in live-streaming services. But it was not always enough. So, first on Palm Sunday and later during Holy Week, Vazquez climbed into the back of a white pickup truck and took the Blessed Sacrament to his congregation instead, driving through the streets of Jerome as parishioners emerged from their homes to pray.
“God is not a God who is in isolation, but a God who is in communion with us, his sons and daughters,” Vazquez said.
Even before Idaho Gov. Brad Little issued the March 25 stay-at-home order that closed non-essential businesses and buildings, faith communities across Idaho were already struggling to adopt social distancing measures that would keep their congregations safe.
While some church leaders like Republican Rep. Tim Remington, the pastor of The Altar Church in Coeur d’Alene, openly flouted Little’s order, many restricted public meetings before the order and took swifter action than even state leaders. The Catholic Diocese of Boise suspended public masses starting March 21. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints temporarily suspended all meetings and activities worldwide on March 12, before Idaho even announced its confirmed case of coronavirus.
Many turn to faith or search for answers in times of trouble. Yet unlike during other hard times in recent history, gathering together or seeking solace in churches, synagogues or other holy places is all but impossible during a global pandemic.
For such restrictions to fall during significant religious holidays — the Easter remembrance of Jesus’ death and resurrection for Christians and Catholics, and Passover for Jews — only makes it clear how much people are giving up due to coronavirus. Often, leaders can only urge hope, and patience.
“The hope is in them, and so it is in me, that this is not eternal,” Vazquez said. “The hope is that we will be back soon.”
Matzah deliveries and Zoom seders for Passover
The first night of Passover, at least, was fairly normal for Beth Harbison and her family. The weather Wednesday evening was clear, which meant Harbison, her husband and her two boys were able to enjoy the traditional seder and the retelling of the story of the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in ancient Egypt in their Boise backyard.
“You don’t usually go to services,” said Harbison, the educational director at Congregation Ahavath Beth Israel in Boise. “It’s not a synagogue holiday, but with family and friends. So, that’s not something we’re missing.”
But the second night of Passover is meant to be shared the greater community, inviting Jewish and non-Jewish friends to share the seder meal. The 125-year-old Congregation Ahavath Beth Israel (CABI) — believed to be the oldest continuously operating synagogue west of the Mississippi — has wholeheartedly embraced virtual gatherings, livestreaming services and posting Facebook videos of everything from different community members leading the candlelighting for the Sabbath or explaining “How to Set a Seder Table: Quarantine Edition.”
On Thursday, Rabbi Dan Fink led the community seder on Zoom, so others could both participate and see faces that they’ve missed.
“These are the times we need our communities the most,” said Amy Duque, the congregation president. Her family used Zoom to have a virtual seder with relatives in several different time zones and her parents, safely isolated only two blocks away. “Just because we can’t be in the same physical space doesn’t mean we can’t be there for each other.”
Coronavirus concerns have pushed the congregation of about 250 families to not just up their “social media game,” but also find new ways to carefully protect and include the elderly and vulnerable community members who face the most risk. Like many others, congregation members have rallied to support their own — delivering groceries to the home-bound, giving financial assistance to families who lost their jobs and making endless rounds of phone calls to just check in.
“In a way, we have opened our minds to be together in ways that we hadn’t before,” said Tamara Ansotegui, executive director of CABI.
The slower pace and isolation has made some things, like Sabbath observation, a little easier. Prayers requiring a minyan — 10 people — can be held over Zoom. Other necessary changes to things like funerals can weigh heavier.
“Even — or especially — in this dark season, it is important to remember our liberation from Egypt,” reads the note placed on matzah boxes delivered to many people in the congregation who couldn’t find or buy their own. “And to find hope that we, too, will be liberated from all of the narrow spaces that currently define us.”
‘God is faithful, even when there is coronavirus’
Many American churches saw an influx of parishioners and seekers in the wake of the terror attacks on Sept. 11. Now, some Idaho churches have seen similar levels of spiritual seekers — just virtually.
Daryl Zachman, the senior pastor of Calvary Chapel Treasure Valley in Boise, said they’ve often streamed their Sunday services, especially during important holidays like Easter. But now their weekly livestream traffic is 10 times what it was before coronavirus.
“Nobody has seen anything like this before, so they’re scared,” Zachman said. “When that happens, people gravitate toward church and try to make sense of things.”
Calvary Chapel Treasure Valley had to switch to virtual meetings quickly, when the Boise elementary school where the congregation usually meets for Sunday worship closed with the rest of Boise School District. But the church has added Zoom Bible studies, YouTube messages and even Facebook Live workout sessions for their home-bound church. Other churches around Idaho have done the same and many, like Capital Church in Meridian, are streaming three services and “kids’ church” online.
Ruby Mendez, a Meridian resident and member of The Church of Latter-day Saints, said her church has emphasized turning toward family while members are unable to attend services in person, following their normal Sunday and Easter traditions of teaching the Gospel and practicing faith at home.
“We’re all trying to understand what this means for us,” Mendez said. “As a family, will this unite us even closer? How differently we might celebrate next year, just knowing what we experienced this year.”
Catholic parishes across Idaho have made innovative adjustments, too, according to Catholic Diocese of Boise spokesman Gene Fadness. St. Paul’s Catholic Church in Nampa is livestreaming using a service called StreamSpot. Holy Spirit Catholic Community in Pocatello is trying to rack up enough YouTube followers to be able to broadcast through a mobile device — a restriction the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is asking YouTube to temporarily lift.
Liturgies with Bishop Peter Christensen from St. John the Evangelist Cathedral in Boise are also broadcast for anyone on www.boisecathedral.com. Sal y Luz or Salt and Light Radio is broadcasting bilingual services statewide for Idaho’s roughly 180,000 Catholics, more than half of whom are Latinos.
Zachman and Fadness pointed out that if the coronavirus pandemic had occurred even 15 or 30 years ago, so many of the virtual methods quickly adopted wouldn’t have been possible. The struggle is that church has always been about people, Fadness said, not a building. Participating in a faith community can be “extremely difficult” when you can’t see those people.
“The challenge has been trying to keep people’s spirits buoyed and hopeful and that soon this will end,” Fadness said. “Right now, it just seems like a long, long Lent.”
For Easter Sunday’s message — which he pre-recorded — Zachman said he’s focusing on what came after Jesus’ resurrection, when he walked with two disciples on the road to Emmaus. The disciples didn’t recognize Jesus at first, Zachman said, not because he wasn’t there but because of their own lack of faith.
“There are so many great promises that God has given us that transcend the circumstances that we’re dealing with,” Zachman said. “God is faithful, even when there is coronavirus.”
This story was originally published April 11, 2020 at 4:30 AM.
