Editor's note: This page has been archived and is no longer being updated regularly. We continue to publish articles about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic here.
Government-provided resources
CDC resource page for small and large gatherings
HHS resource on faith, community and mental health during the COVID-19 crisis (PDF)
Pastoral resources
Stop the Spread Playbook for Community-based Vaccinations
Stop the Spread: Practices and tools for planning, co-designing, and implementing community-based models that advance vaccine equity.
10 guidelines for pastoral care during the coronavirus outbreak
Christian Century: How can we accompany people through this valley of anxiety, fear and death?
Pandemic changes worth keeping
Calvin Institute of Christian Worship: So much has changed about church worship since the COVID-19 pandemic arrived, soared, waned, and resurges. Those pandemic-forced pivots have created worship opportunities that have helped congregations adapt, find unity amid division, and pursue justice.
Guide: Forum for Theological Exploration’s Guide to Gathering Virtually
When churches reopen, don’t sing or shake hands, do make sermons short, says guide
Religion News Service: An ecumenical group of clergy, scientists and other experts has released a guide to help congregations consider best practices for reopening for worship.
Guide: Resuming care-filled worship and sacramental life during a pandemic (PDF)
10 ideas for church financial leaders amid the COVID-19 crisis
UMC Discipleship: Here are some directions for financial leaders across the church to help with sustaining the church and its ministry as we live through the coronavirus crisis.
Guide for Christian funerals during COVID-19 (PDF)
Massachusetts Council of Churches: In times of trial like the death of a loved one, we turn to the familiar practices from our faith and ancestors. And so, we know that this disruption for a grieving community is doubly hard.
Religion news and opinion
The pandemic and the future of theology: A conversation with Stanley Hauerwas
Australian Broadcasting Corporation: In response to questions about how the pandemic has posed a challenge to Christian life, Hauerwas was not content to offer authoritative responses.
Renewing faith, or losing it, in the time of COVID-19
Los Angeles Times: The last two years have transformed the stability of our families, our jobs and our collective understanding of science and sacrifice. But, for many of us, COVID-19’s reach also rewired something more elemental: our faith.
For many immunosuppressed, churches stopped being a safe place
The Washington Post: The same sanctuaries where many sing and embrace each other have become anxiety-inducing, and possibly dangerous, for many Americans who are considered higher risk for COVID-19.
Death, addiction, grace: a year as chaplain in New York’s toughest hospital
The Guardian: While training as a chaplain and caring for society’s most vulnerable, Bryan Mealer learned that spiritual care is an act of social justice.
Faith leaders’ year of pandemic: grief, solace, resilience
Associated Press: The pandemic, said one assistant pastor, “has called us to rethink and re-imagine what our philosophy of ministering really is in the age of COVID.”
Other news and opinion
The other long Covid
Vox: The pandemic took young people’s present. What will it do to their future?
Is it time for a reality check on rapid COVID tests?
NPR: As the COVID-19 pandemic enters its fourth year, a negative result on a little plastic at-home test feels a bit less comforting than it once did.
‘We are in trouble’: Study raises alarm about impacts of long COVID
The Washington Post: A new long-COVID study based on the experiences of nearly 100,000 participants provides powerful evidence that many people do not fully recover months after being infected with the coronavirus.
America is choosing to stay vulnerable to pandemics
The Atlantic: The pandemic’s legacy is already clear: all of this will happen again.
There is nothing normal about one million people dead from COVID
Scientific American: Mass media and policy makers are pushing for a return to pre‐COVID times while trying to normalize a staggering death toll.
Will we ever grasp the enormity of the pandemic?
GEN Magazine: As long as we focus on deaths and statistics, the bigger story of Covid-19 will go untold.
