As we’re already seeing, once Safe At Home orders are rescinded, it doesn’t mean a return to what once was. Restaurants, shops, music venues, theaters, and places of worship will continue to be affected by social distancing measures and limits to the number of people on premise.
This means churches will continue streaming worship services and pre-recorded services to provide for those unable or unwilling to attend physical worship services. It’s possible that some will prefer this new way of “doing church” and welcome being able to watch live or recorded services at their convenience. It seems new habits are being formed. In the world of music, a recent survey found that 74% of music fans plan to continue watching live streams from musicians even as the live-show circuit resumes.
How long before sanctuaries open? Many are watching public health guidance for how to handle worship and other congregational gatherings in the next few months. As we are already seeing, federal, state, and local authorities are staging or phasing reopenings based on improving COVID-19 metrics.
Forward-looking worship leaders wanting to plan ahead will want to check their own state’s opening plans, as well as information shared by regional church leadership.
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In my own region, the Wisconsin Council of Churches has offered specific guidance for the months ahead, drawing from Wisconsin’s reopening guidelines. You can find the Council’s very helpful document, “Returning to Church” here:
In a nutshell, the Wisconsin Council of Churches recommends to its churches that online worship continues well into the future. Even when public worship can resume, social distancing and attendance limits will keep some people at home. Others may simply prefer online worship, now that they’re used to it, and still other higher risk individuals (defined as people over 60, and those with underlying conditions) will be advised to continue to shelter at home (and experience worship remotely) until an all-clear is sounded.
This means churches will want to plan for online/remote worship for a long time forward. In case you haven’t done this yet, you might consider getting a proper license for streaming worship. There are several companies who offer these licenses, and the streaming video license is often simply added to the music license your church already holds.
A Podcast/Streaming license permits both pre-recorded content and live-streamed content to be posted to your website, YouTube, Facebook, Zoom, Vimeo, Instagram, and other similar online platforms. Check with the company whose license you already have for music, or simply search for church streaming licenses. One License and CCLI are examples of two licensing companies who work with churches.
The good news is that you’re probably getting quite good at screen-based, online worship! If it’s still a struggle, consider these improvements:
--enlist others to help out by reading, submitting photographs, offering live music
--get people up and moving with physical responses to prayers and songs
--keep it visually interesting: offer full-screen visuals that keep your theme or main message in front of people
--don’t forget to promote different ways of giving, and do your usual offering rituals of song/prayer/ and thanksgiving
--check your denomination’s growing worship resource library for videos/music/imagery
--make sure you have your proper licenses and display your license number on screen
--keep the service time short: many are finding they just can’t process so much on-screen information
-- focus your theme and message: remember something as short (and focused) as a 30-second commercial can be interesting, memorable, stimulating, amusing, and persuasive.
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