Paving the road to hell? - Rector's Rambling for September 13, 2020

 I recently heard someone utter that old adage “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” and it struck me as particularly true at this time.

We all want to keep each other safe.  During our current pandemic we have done things like “stay home and stay safe” and wear masks and social distance in order to “keep others safe” and not spread the virus.  That is a good thing – nobody wants to endanger others.

But Satan has an old trick up his sleeve, one that he uses to damaging effect.  He takes the best of our intentions and desires, and finds a way to distort them.  He is not creative, but destructive.  And he is having at it at this time.

What is a good desire to stop the spread of this virus has now become a deep-seated fear of being with others.  The devil has pushed us over the edge from caution to fear, and this kind of fear damages psychologically as well as spiritually.  And this fear is now preventing people from attending public worship.  The devil rejoices that people are NOT receiving Communion.  He is so glad that we are spiritually starving ourselves by thinking it is not safe for us to be in church together in order to worship.  And if I hadn’t been assured in Scripture that the gates of Hell will not prevail of Jesus’ Church, I would be more worried that a mortal blow has been struck to the church under the guise of trying to keep one another safe.

St. John’s has been open for Public Worship since the beginning of July, the only Episcopal Church in the city of Detroit.  The Roman Catholic Churches have been open since May 19 and other churches opened up somewhere in-between.  Taking reasonable precautions of wearing masks, social distancing in our spacious building, and receiving Communion in just one kind (the bread) for now, not only are we able to prevent the spread, but more importantly, we ARE WORSHIPPING and we ARE RECEIVING COMMUNION!  Thanks be to God.  And nowhere in Metro Detroit has there been a spread of COVID-19 in a church taking these reasonable precautions.

If you have been exposed to COVID-19, or have other health issues that put you at high risk, please continue to absent yourself physically from public gathering at Church and continue to participate via livestream.

But if you are able to go to work, go to school, go to the store, go to museums/parks/zoo/gyms or other public places, but you think that being at Church to worship the Living God and to receive Communion is too dangerous, give me a call and we can chat about it.

All of life involves risk, and we take precautions to mitigate that risk.  Precautions are being taken in the Church and we do feel that it is very important for us and for the world that we be together in prayer now more than ever!

Social distancing requirements are that we be at 25% of occupancy, which means we can have 25 people at the 8:00 AM Service, 200 at the 10:00 AM Service, and 200 at the 5:00 PM Service.  Right now we are getting about 60 people all together at the three Services.  Last year our Average Sunday attendance was 157.  Praying now that we move closer to maximum occupancy of 425.  See you in Church.