SINGAPORE – Cornerstone Community Church is now a physical and digital hybrid that reaches an audience in Singapore and beyond.
The 5,000-strong church streams weekend services for its stay-home congregation. This month, it has also joined the nation in the phase two reopening, with groups of 50 re-gathering first at its Katong branch and then on Sunday (July 19) at its Bugis premises, the pastors preaching behind face shields.
On a visit to the Katong auditorium on July 11, chairs were spaced more than the mandatory metre apart in the once-packed hall where 950 people would sing to contemporary music.
Now, 50 people worshipped silently, while a remote worship team, fragmented into Zoom rectangles, was beamed onto the jumbotron screen.
A sense of the pandemic was prevalent. KYMO – Keep Your Mask On – flashed on-screen. Service time was halved to 45 minutes for surfaces to be sanitised, while worshippers exited promptly without cross-mingling with the next congregation.
Although it is easier for the independent church to stick to online-only services, its leaders want to prepare for the step-by-step lifting of capacity limits. Also, collective worship is ingrained in Christian life, its pastors say.
Teacher Lee Chin Sin, 50, has been setting an alarm every Friday at noon to make sure she gets seats for Cornerstone's on-site service.
"I was very moved, even on the way to church. We have been going to church for 30 years, and it's very much part of our life," she says. "Of course, there was a tinge of sadness because the auditorium was so empty."
Changes like the no-singing rule do not bother her. "Worship is really the mind focusing on God," she reasons.
Watching an online service on a computer at home can be "a bit impersonal" – although there is an interactive live chat, plus apps aplenty, say, for sermon notes.
While not all churches are new hybrids like Cornerstone, most have online services. Most of their leaders are contemplating the rise of the e-church, with its possibilities and perils.
The upside is that virtual churches can go global. Online cell groups and prayer meetings at churches big and small – including the Presbyterian denomination with 37 congregations – are well attended because time-crunched parishioners simply click on a link at home.
The flip side is that some find it novel to church-hop when browsing a never-ending menu of Sunday services here or globally.
Hence, pastors are seeking new ways to connect with their scattered flock, whether through online prayer, prizes mailed to Sunday school children who nail Bible quizzes, or even homespun cooking tutorials.
As needs escalate, churches are supporting the jobless in their midst. The more tech-savvy churches also pitch in to help less-resourced ones set up virtual churches.
While these larger forces are at play, over at the Church of the Holy Family, a Roman Catholic parish down the road from Cornerstone in Katong, retired accountant Sylvia Khoo savoured the intimacy of on-site mass when the doors opened again to circles of 50 earlier this month.
"It was joyful to hear the pealing of the bells again," says Ms Khoo, who is in her 60s. After getting used to online mass for five months, she felt a "sudden wow" seeing the altar and the pews again – even if many were cordoned off. Other pews had hand sanitisers and QR codes for contact tracing.
"Worshipping together as a community is so important," adds Ms Khoo, who can now take part in rituals like communion at the church of 8,000, albeit by slot booking.
As Catholic churches progressively reopen this month, parishioners are limited to one mass a month at a church they select, with routine church-hopping now disallowed.
During the first weekend, close to 2,000 Catholics celebrated mass in eight churches. There are 360,000 Catholics spread across 32 churches here.
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Singapore still urges the vulnerable, such as senior citizens above age 60 and those with medical conditions, to stick with mass online.
Meanwhile, some smaller Protestant parishes with fewer than 500 members, such as Sembawang Presbyterian Church, are also circling back to physical services, while megachurches like City Harvest and New Creation are staying online for now.
The desire for on-site services was borne out in an online survey of Christians conducted from May 11 to 18, in the middle of the circuit breaker.
Over 1,600 responses were logged for this burning question: "If/when things return to a state of normalcy, are you likely to attend online church services?"
HAPPY WITH A HYBRID[hhmc]
Mr Edric Sng, chief executive officer of Thirst Collective, a digital Christian news platform which includes the Thir.st and Salt&Light websites and pushed out the straw poll, says of the overall result: "Almost 95 per cent said they would continue to do on-site church."
Of this 95 per cent majority, more than half said they much prefer physically attending church. The rest were happy with a hybrid, saying they would likely go to both physical and online churches.
"Only 5.38 per cent said they would default to online only," he says.
Mindful of the real need for community, churches are tending to their charges afresh – and from afar.
At City Harvest, a megachurch of 16,000, children aged three to 12 join Zoom services. Those who submit correct answers to Bible quizzes get prizes in the mail.
The dialect-speaking elderly can view video sermons in Cantonese and Hokkien on YouTube, or receive calls and care packs that include masks and Bible verses from staff. Visits in phase two are now possible.
More energetic staff meet for Zoom workouts before work or join cooking tutorials by the hospitality pastor, whose repertoire includes Hakka bak chor mee.
Such personal touches are also important for Cornerstone. Its staff made 4,300 phone calls to church members during the circuit breaker.
Among its online moves are 8am devotionals where spiritual leaders share wisdom in bite-sized videos. There are conversations with pastors to keep everyone in the loop or ask questions, for example, about Senior Pastor Yang Tuck Yoong's book-writing plans.
With the fallout from Covid-19, Cornerstone is among many churches now boosting support systems for their members and the local community.
Some years back, the Cornerstone leadership presciently created a special fund for the congregation ahead of tough times. "Well, the time did come and in April, we officially launched the Cornerstone Cares Fund," says Pastor Yang.
The church set aside a $1 million seed fund. It also pledged to match donations dollar for dollar, up to a total of $3 million of co-funding. The total target is $4 million.
"More than 100 families have applied for the fund successfully since the launch in April, and near $250,000 has been disbursed."
The youthful Heart of God Church has since April given $170,100 in financial aid to 144 members. One hundred recipients are students, in the church of 5,000-plus where the average age is 22.
To replenish national blood stocks sapped by the pandemic, the church teamed up with Khalid Mosque and two clan associations for a blood donation drive last month.
New Creation Church, which has over 30,000 members, also had a blood donation drive. It has distributed foodcourt gift cards to cleaners at Tan Tock Seng Hospital and sent more than 600 personalised cards to cheer up the elderly.
Elsewhere, the Hope Church, aware that the pandemic can cause marital rifts, invited any affected members to seek support at its family life ministry. Beyond Singapore, many churches like The Bible Church are supporting overseas missions work, and have stepped up this role.
In an e-churchRead More – Source
[contf] [contfnew]
