(OPINION) The most contentious of the religious freedom issues raised by the coronavirus pandemic has been some governments’ outright bans on religious gatherings, as in the earliest days in the U.K., or the now more common stringent limits on most religious gatherings. This has been a persistent and growing issue in the U.S. (and elsewhere).

There are several cautions necessary, lest we exaggerate how widespread has been the resistance by churches to restrictions on worship, and the effects of theology on this resistance. First, the vast majority of churches, mosques, synagogues, temples and other houses of worship have followed government guidelines for lockdowns and restrictions on in-person worship, and many have self-imposed limits more stringent than those ordered by governments.

Second, the U.S. has a highly individualistic society wherein, regardless of theology or ideology, many people simply resent being told what to do. This also shows itself in resistance to wearing masks, which is widespread, although still very much a minority position. Third, many of the churches that have resisted restrictions are independent and often fringe bodies, at the edge of Pentecostalism and commonly with ties to the ‘prosperity gospel.’ One example is Rodney Howard Browne, a pastor arrested for defying closure restrictions in Florida, who is deeply into “holy laughing.” 

Fourth, churches have been scapegoated for viral spread, even if their contribution was not large. The New York Times ran an op-ed with the title “The Road to Coronavirus Hell Was Paved by Evangelicals,” though the headline was later changed to the milder but still tendentious “The Religious Right’s Hostility to Science Is Crippling Our Coronavirus Response.” Later the Times published an article with the title “Churches Emerge as Major Source of Coronavirus Cases.” However, the article traced only 650 cases to churches, while on July 8, 2020, the day that the piece was published, the total number of reported cases in the U.S. was 2,923,432. Hence, the article traced only 0.022% of cases to churches, which hardly qualifies as a “major source.”

Finally, governments have often overstepped their bounds. New York Mayor De Blasio threatened to close some Orthodox synagogues permanently, which he would not have the power to do, and meanwhile let demonstrators violate social distancing and mask rules. In some cases, the Justice Department’s Office of Civil Rights has needed to step in. Hence, we should not assume that every church resistance to a government order related to public health is unjustified. In some situations, they have a good case to be made that governments are acting in a discriminatory way. In the case of Calvary Chapel Dayton Valley v. Steve Sisolak, the Nevada government put restrictions on religious gatherings while giving much wider latitude to casinos. This led the humorous, satirical site, the Babylon Bee, to concoct a story of how the Calvary Chapel church managed to remain open by installing slot machines in the sanctuary and thus qualifying as a casino (and also boosting its revenue).

Separation of Church and State?

However, there are cases in which churches resist apparently legitimate orders. On July 13, 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsome ordered that 30 California counties, including Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Orange and Riverside, shutter gyms, houses of worship, hair salons, malls and other businesses, which was effective immediately and was to remain in effect indefinitely. Unlike Nevada, the ruling applied to nearly all relevant institutions: houses of worship were not subject to more restrictive limits than similarly structured secular bodies. Still, some churches, such as Destiny Church and 412 Church Murrieta, said that they would defy the order and remain open.

Notably, John MacArthur, an influential conservative pastor who had earlier followed government guidelines, said that his Grace Community Church would henceforth engage in public worship. He and the church argued that “while civil government is invested with divine authority to rule the state,” no biblical texts grant “civic rulers jurisdiction over the church.” He also stated that “the biblical framework limits the authority of each institution to its specific jurisdiction….”

But this and similar responses fall into a trap, often shared by secularists, of implying that the realms of church and state have clear boundaries and never properly interact and intertwine—in short that they can functionally be separate. Tim Thompson, the founding pastor of 412 Church Murrieta stated that “this has everything to do with understanding that we live in a democratic republic, and there is a concept of the separation of church and state.”

However, religious bodies and states are nearly always intertwined, otherwise there would not be so many disputes about their relationships and respective authority.

Churches, synagogues, mosques and other religious institutions follow building codes and are also affected by zoning, parking, traffic and noise regulations. As Brad Littlejohn notes, “The magistrate cannot ban a minister from preaching the Gospel; but if the minister commits a crime, he may certainly be detained and imprisoned, which may mean that a particular congregation has to go without a preacher for a time. Indeed, he might even be detained and imprisoned for something he says in his preaching, if he was inciting a riot or speaking treason….” In turn, churches have criticized and denied communion to politicians who they believe are violating church teachings in the laws they make or enforce, and it is not, so far, in legal dispute that a church can decide for itself who may receive communion from its priests.

Conclusions

As these examples show, church and state may have authority over one another according to their respective missions as long as they do not seek to usurp the proper role of the other. A church cannot try to take over governmental power or use physical coercion. A government cannot dictate a church’s doctrine or mission.

Governments within the U.S. and elsewhere have imposed widely varying restrictions, and there can be certainly be arguments about each particular case. But most of these restrictions have been justified, somewhat like the fire marshal writ large. They also do not single out the church but are applied to almost any similar gathering. And they do not seek to usurp core church teachings or mission. As John Inazu has written, “The government would need to articulate a compelling interest… and its directive would need to be narrowly tailored and executed in the least restrictive means towards accomplishing its interest. That’s a very high standard, and one that’s not usually satisfied. But the government is likely to meet it here.”