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Lakselvbukt Church in Norway |
It was preternaturally quiet in my neighborhood last night, even more so that it was at the beginning of the Wuhan Pandemic lock-down. The month of May is usually when people around here start intermittent testing of whatever fireworks they can obtain in the run-up to Independence Day.
Only the occasion far off explosion and a couple of helicopters broke the general silence.
Yesterday was interesting. My church has been live-streaming Sunday service almost from the beginning of the lock-down. Then, a couple of weeks ago, my pastor decided that enough was enough and planned to open for regular service, albeit under the guidelines prescribed by the CDC.
This was decided before all the back and forth about whether California churches should be allowed to resume operations.
Allowed.
A sharply divided Supreme Court late Friday turned aside a church's urgent plea that California's coronavirus lockdown orders are putting an unconstitutional burden on religious freedom.
Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the court's liberals in rejecting a San Diego church's request for relief from Gov. Gavin Newsom's most recent directive limiting churches to 25% of their normal maximum capacity, with an absolute maximum of 100 people at any service.Anyway, a week ago I had been thinking that there might be some push-back from local/state law enforcement when we again gathered together in the name of Jesus. I prayed about it, of course, and asked God that whatever happened, He would get the glory.
Immediately afterward the killing of George Floyd became news, spurring the subsequent national riots.
I haven’t checked to see which other California churches and other houses of worship conducted services this weekend, but ours did and there were more than 100 people there.
However, I’m going to guess that our local law enforcement entities might have had their hands too full to police up any worshipers of the deity of their choice. Coincidence? I don't believe in those.
We’ll see what happens next week.
In the meantime, there is protection to be had by any who ask. But there are conditions.
