Research documents Covid faith impact 

Professor Paul Weller, a Baptist church member, introduces an accessible digest and analysis of Covid-related research and resources (2020-2023) on Christian Faith Based Organisations (FBO) in Great Britain

 
 
On both global and national levels the COVID-19 pandemic at its peak presented what has been one of the biggest health, economic, social and religious challenges of the 21st century so far.

Furthermore, as the Evangelical Alliance’s introduction to its Autumn 2020 Changing Church: autumn survey noted, “The coronavirus pandemic has proven to be a marathon not a sprint.”

Since then both Church and the wider society have recognised that, in order to be better prepared for any similar future challenges, it is important better to understand aspects of what happened during this crisis.

And, as was reported by The Baptist Times in 2020, I was fortunate enough to receive a COVID-19 Special Research Grant from the British Academy to conduct research on The Organisational, Financial and Human Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on the Christian Faith-Based Organisation Service Sector in Great Britain.

This project is now complete. Its detailed findings have been published as a review article in the journal Religions which can be directly and freely downloaded and read via this link. 

Through this article, I hope to offer an accessible digest of what is otherwise a vast and potentially overwhelming range of relevant research and resource materials, especially for those working in and with Christian Faith Based Organizations (FBOs) who may themselves not have the time to work through such a large amount of relevant research and resources.

As first planned and approved the project had, during 2020-21, intended to conduct an online survey across Christian Faith-Based Organizations in Great Britain and to report on its findings in ways that might have been able to make a “real-time” impact on then current issues of policy and funding.

However, research projects do not always go as originally planned and, for reasons that are explained in the article, in place of that original plan it was agreed with the British Academy that the project should instead conduct a review of all relevant research and resources and produce a digest and analysis of it.

Because of this, it must be acknowledged that there was a loss of what would otherwise have been important survey data. But because the COVID-19 pandemic turned out to be more a “marathon” than a “sprint”, the different focus and longer than originally intended timescale of the project meant that it has been possible to take into account relevant research and resources across 2020-2023.

In doing so, the project has also been able to differentiate between the emergence of the pandemic; the peak of its spread and impact; its post-vaccine more “endemic” phase; and its post-pandemic period, and therefore to offer a more comprehensive and rounded perspective than would have been possible under the original plan.

This published article is therefore offered as an accessible digest of the research and resources produced by others, set within the framework of an analysis that I have developed as author of the article. But for those reading this who might not even get as far as clicking through to the article itself, and hopefully to encourage all to spend a little time in doing so, the headlines from the project and article are, as follows:

That in describing and evaluating the contributions made by Christian FBOs during the COVID-19 pandemic in Great Britain; the stresses and strains faced by them; and the ways forward now open to them, it is:

• generally helpful to understand Christian Faith Based Organizations in the context of the FBOs of other religions 
• and also as a part of the broader Voluntary and Community sector.

At the same time, specifically for understanding the work of the Christian FBOs during the pandemic; their situation now; and their future prospects, it is also:

• critically important to understand that the work done by Christian FBOs was carried out as a part of what might be called a wider “Christian ecology”, which is the context within which Christian FBOs live; to which they contribute; and apart from which they cannot be properly understood. 
• and also that, while local “churches”, congregations, and “church projects” play a role in this wider “Christian ecology”, it is the Christian “networks” with which Christian FBOs are connected that are key to this “Christian ecology”.

In more detailed terms, the findings of the project highlight that:

• During the pandemic, local authorities played an important role in support and facilitation of the work of Christian and other Faith-Based Organizations. 
• Christian FBOS were especially involved in the provision of food support, especially in the first phase of the pandemic. 
• During the second phase of the pandemic, Christian FBOs became increasingly involved in mental health support. 
• Generally speaking, the pandemic had a negative effect on the finances of Christian Faith Based Organizations – while demand went up, giving declined. 
• Collaboration between FBOs and public authorities in the provision of services during the pandemic helped to build mutual trust which in many cases laid the foundations for this move beyond one-off projects to more co-operative and structural partnerships. 
• At the same time, FBOs want to avoid any potential instrumentalisation by the “powers-that-be” and any weakening of their ability, precisely as Faith-Based Organizations, when necessary, to be prophetically critical of government policies.

Image | engin akyurt | Unsplash
 

Paul Weller is a member of Broadway Baptist Church in Derby, where he is Emeritus Professor of the University of Derby. He is also a Non-Stipendiary Research Fellow in Religion and Society and Associate Director (UK) of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture at Regent's Park College, a Baptist foundation Permanent Private Hall of the University of Oxford.

This project was, however, undertaken from his other academic base at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations at Coventry University