Yes, Online Church is Real
We’re pretty late to the party on this “debate.” It was over three weeks ago that a controversial opinion piece ran in the New York Times about how all churches should stop offering online services. [Here’s the article, but beware the NYT paywall.] The blog post you are now reading is not a response to that piece specifically, but to the broader question of whether gathering online “counts.” Whether connections on Zoom are real. Whether a church’s fellowship can exist on the internet.
Since we are a fully online faith community who will exist for the rest of our days online (or in whatever future hologram metaverse is coming), you may not be surprised that our answer is YES. Of course what we’re doing is real and meaningful, and it’s “church” as far as we’re concerned.
There’s a lot to consider in this ridiculous debate, but let’s quickly touch on three key questions:
What is a church?
What is gained and lost by gathering online?
Is this just a high church vs. low church squabble?
What is a church?
I don’t have a tight definition to guide us here—to a large extent, each person and each community can decide what a church is to them. For me, it’s gathered people who are committed to each other in love, and who ground that love in a shared Christian faith. This sort of understanding of a church community can clearly exist online.
Now, there are other historical definitions that add new dimensions… the phrases “one holy, catholic, and apostolic” and “Word and sacrament” come to mind. But the fact is that any common definition of church can be satisfied by online communities. The sacrament part may be the trickiest, but this is only an issue for certain theologies. More on that below.
Some of the concern about online church is that it will be consumeristic and selfish. My response is—what kind of gathering are you facilitating? Yes, if you are simply creating a video of a church service and plopping it on YouTube, that’s not a meaningful experience. It is on the church to create participatory online connections. This is no different from the church’s responsibility to create an in-person gathering that is not one-directional and consumeristic!
Not only do online churches meet certain (human-made!) standards for what is a church, they also provide immense benefits.
What is lost and gained?
There are two main areas of benefit to online church: health/disability and geography. For one, we are still in the middle of a global pandemic. Even if the numbers look better in many areas, there’s still a significant health risk to public gatherings. So for the time being, in my opinion, it makes sense for all church communities to meet (only) online. But even outside of COVID times, some people with disabilities are not able to physically attend a church service in a building. Online gatherings enable every member of the community (with access to the internet) to participate in the life of the church.
In addition to these considerations, there are questions of geography. In certain parts of the world, there are no churches. More relevant to a place like Harbor is that in many parts of the world, there are no LGBTQ-celebrating, anti-racist, hospitable churches. What are people in these communities supposed to do? Unless they have the fortitude, connections, resources, and calling to start a church, they can either abandon church or find one online. If we were to follow the NYT conservative Anglican priest’s advice to shut down all online worship, these folks would be out of luck.
So with online gatherings, we gain protection from a plague, access for folks with disabilities, and a life-giving community for those who do not have physical proximity to one. But we should note that there are costs. There is truly something wonderful about sitting with someone in the same room, giving them a hug. It can be beautiful to enjoy or participate in live music together, something that is super difficult on Zoom. It’s lovely to share a meal at the same table.
These are real costs. But for many—especially those who don’t have access to a physical church community that will work for them—the costs are easily worth it.
What’s up with high church people?
The case could be made that the article in the Times only bears any relevance for those in the “high church.” The terms high church and low church came about in the context of the Church of England (Anglicanism), which sought to be a sort of bridge between Catholicism and Protestantism. High Church folks, who were much closer to Roman Catholicism, started calling others “low church” as a pejorative, to make fun of those (quoting Wikipedia) “who give relatively little emphasis to ritual, sacraments, and sometimes the authority of clergy.” Meanwhile, those embracing the “high church” do emphasize these things, and also stress “formality and resisting modernization.”
No surprise, then, that a high-church Anglican wrote a piece resisting the modernization of online church. In addition, her article stressed that physical gathering is essential for the Eucharist and baptism—two formal, sacramental rituals that can only be performed in that tradition by clergy! So this is all par for the course for that author’s denomination (ACNA).
Here at Harbor, suffice it to say we are low church. We do not place emphasis on formality, sacraments, or the authority of clergy. So for us, all those arguments against online church are pretty much irrelevant. But while we’re talking about this, allow me to suggest that low church is needed. Plenty of people will never step foot (physically or digitally) in a high church setting. So it would be great if our high church friends would accept our Christianity as real. And in return, we can refrain from maligning your sacramental theology as authoritarian magic. Deal?
