A handful of holdout U.S. churches plan to hold in-person services on Easter Sunday, saying their right to worship in person outweighs public health officials’ warnings against holding large gatherings during the coronavirus outbreak, Reuters reported.
Most U.S. churches are expected to be closed on Sunday, and a broad majority of observant Americans are expected to follow authorities’ recommendations to avoid crowds to limit the spread of the potentially lethal COVID-19 respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus. However, not all of them.
“Satan and a virus will not stop us,” said the Reverend Tony Spell, 42, pastor of the evangelical Life Tabernacle Church near Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He expects a crowd of more than 2,000 to gather in worship at his megachurch on Sunday.
“God will shield us from all harm and sickness,” Spell said in an interview. “We are not afraid. We are called by God to stand against the Antichrist creeping into America’s borders. We will spread the Gospel.”
The COVID-19 pandemic has claimed more than 14,700 lives across the United States and infected more than 431,700 people, with officials predicting the worst is yet to come.
Major U.S. religious institutions, including Roman Catholic dioceses and major Protestant denominations, will hold religious services online as well as through local broadcast radio and television, with just a handful of ministers and priests preaching sermons and reading liturgies to rows of empty pews.
Indeed, some major religious-liberty legal advocacy groups, whose mission is to challenge restrictions on freedom of religion, have not raised objections to the closures, saying churches have been treated the same as other major institutions and that safety comes first.
In Idaho, Ammon Bundy, who has led multiple standoffs against authorities in acts of protest against the federal government, plans to gather hundreds of people for an Easter observance, in defiance of public health advice, according to multiple media reports.
Another holdout church, the evangelical Cross Culture Center in Lodi, California, about 70 miles (110 km) southwest of San Francisco, plans another service even after its members found their church doors locked against them last weekend.
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