Christianity & Corona

How a prayer meeting at a French megachurch may have led to scores of coronavirus deaths

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/how-a-prayer-meeting-at-a-french-megachurch-may-have-led-to-scores-of-coronavirus-deaths/2020/04/01/fe478ca0-7396-11ea-ad9b-254ec99993bc_story.html wrote:PARIS — The prayer meeting at an evangelical church in Mulhouse, a small city in eastern France near the border with Germany, was just the latest in a series of such annual gatherings going back a generation.

But this year’s meeting — in the words of a regional health official — was “a kind of atomic bomb that went off in the town in late February that we didn’t see.” Someone in the crowd of 2,500 had the novel coronavirus, kicking off what soon became one of Europe’s largest regional clusters of infections, which then quickly spread across the country and eventually overseas.

When the five-day prayer meeting at the evangelical church — known as Christian Open Door — began Feb. 17, France only had 12 confirmed cases of covid-19, with none of those in Alsace, the region where Mulhouse is located.

South Korea seeks criminal charges against Christian sect over coronavirus spread

https://www.france24.com/en/20200303-south-korea-seeks-criminal-charges-against-christian-sect-over-coronavirus-spread wrote:The discovery of a hotbed of infection in Taegu and the link made with the Shincheonji Church of Jesus was a turning point in South Korea’s coronavirus battle. Authorities then came up against the very secretive practises of the sect. Aware of the group’s poor image within the country, the faithful often keep their membership secret from their relations, even from their parents.

“To Shincheonji members, their priority is not the safety issue but rather protecting" the church, Ji-il Tark, a Busan Presbyterian University theology professor who studies the group, told the Wall Street Journal. As such, in the province of Gyeonggi, the local government had to rely on some 200 volunteers from the movement in order to contact other followers, CNN reported, because Shincheonji members often don’t take phone calls from non-members.

The group’s religious practises also lent to the rapid spread of the virus. They meet often in small halls, where they are huddled close together. Members aren’t allowed to wear any accessories on their faces – like glasses or protective masks – because they are considered insults to God, several former members of the movement told South Korean media.

Moreover, participating in weekly meetings is mandatory – rain or shine, and even in case of illness. Members of the movement must clock in when they arrive and when they leave a “working session”, which allows executives of the group to monitor devotees’ diligence. A cold or early signs of flu would not be considered sufficient to exonerate a member from doing his or her duty to preach the Good Word.

Authoritarian Christians are deliberately undermining the US public health response to coronavirus

https://conversationalist.org/2020/03/27/authoritarian-christians-are-deliberately-undermining-the-public-health-response-to-coronavirus/ wrote:In the United States, there are fundamentalist Christians who see institutions like the WHO and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as part of a “godless liberal” plot. Tony Spell, the Apostolic Pastor of Tabernacle Life Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, said: “The virus, we believe, is politically motivated.” He made this statement during a church service reportedly attended by 350 people on the evening of Tuesday, March 17, in defiance of a ban on gatherings of more than 50 people issued by Louisiana Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards.

While CBS News reported that police told Spell the National Guard would break up any future gatherings at his church, a FOX News report quotes Louisiana National Guard Colonel Ed Bush denying that any such order has been issued. In any case, Life Tabernacle Church doubled down, bragging that it planned to bring 27 buses’ worth of area children to church on Sunday, March 22;  and, according to a public Facebook post by Tony Spell’s father Timothy, that they planned to host a blood drive on the same day. And the church followed through.

According to Gagné, “Some neo-charismatics believe that ‘end-time’ Christians will be able to heal people from plagues, diseases, or any other physical conditions, and even take dominion over entire hospitals, healing every patient in them by laying hands on the building.”