#225 COVID-19 and Faith: Our Updates

The COVID-19 pandemic is clearly not over for many across the world, but the rhythm of events and reports has changed. COVID-19-specific reports recede and blend with the multiple crises facing the world in late 2022.

Therefore, the team that took on the challenge of tracking and learning from the faith dimensions of the pandemic is shifting gears. Updates in the future will be quarterly or, should major new perspectives emerge, on a case-by-case basis. We will continue to maintain the repository with the wide range of resources that we have collected thus far, including articles, webinars, interviews, press notes, and more.

This is our two hundred twenty-fifth update. To recall, during a meeting at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center on March 11, 2020, in the then rather experimental hybrid mode, a team comprised of members from the Berkley Center, the World Faiths Development Dialogue (WFDD), and the Joint Learning Initiative on Faith and Local Partners (JLI) agreed to work together to follow how religious communities were responding to the fast-moving pandemic and how their responses were shaping it. We had little inkling then about how long the pandemic would rage or its profound global impact. At first our updates were daily, but then they shifted to a weekly model, and they developed alongside building the repository of information and other project outputs, notably webinars aimed at linking people in affected communities. Significant parallel efforts included work with the WHO EPI-WIN outreach to faith communities, as well as cooperation with Religions for Peace and with Faiths4Vaccines. Information about this specific project is gathered here on the Berkley Center website.

The project set out to follow but above all to learn from the COVID-19 experience. We have framed and pursued a constantly updated set of questions and emerging hypotheses and reflections about both the short-term and enduring impacts of the pandemic. Some are reflected in articles and blogs, and others will be published in the months ahead. Teaching courses at Georgetown University has engaged the lived experience of students and helped to identify case studies (e.g., looking at the practical and ethical decisions involved in lockdowns). The G20 Interfaith Forum has highlighted policy implications and the work of the “network of networks” that has, in many ways, also helped to frame analysis and proposals for G20 and other leaders. The learning process and anticipated policy changes will continue.

Meanwhile, an ongoing question is whether or not the pandemic is truly coming to an end. A recent article contests President Biden’s assertion that the pandemic is over. It highlights the spiritual challenges involved as we look ahead, ones that we see as central themes running through our pandemic reflections: “But ‘You do you’ has never been the gospel. Again and again, Jesus aligned himself with the most vulnerable members of his society: widows, children, the poor, the chronically ill. He makes it clear that the measure of our faithfulness isn’t how we provide for those who are thriving, but how we fiercely love our neighbors, especially the most vulnerable. Biden’s declaration that ‘everybody seems to be in pretty good shape’ flatly ignores the people who are still suffering or most at risk. It’s certainly not true for the nearly 3,000 Americans who died last week.”

Meanwhile, recent studies illustrate the types of study, commentary, and analysis we have seen thus far, highlighting both global trends and context-specific impacts. For instance, a Christian Aid study finds that COVID-19 linked restrictions has contributed to the trend to limit civil society space in wide-ranging country situations. Also, a Christian Aid podcast series includes a discussion about what can be learned through a faith focus in Rohingya camps in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazaar.

Do please continue to share information or questions with us, as we maintain and build the repository as a resource for the foreseeable future.