Vicars like me are struggling in lockdown

A year of living through a pandemic has taken its toll on the best of us. Vicars like me are no exception. 

As a healthy and normally upbeat 52-year-old, this feeling of gloom is frighteningly new. Anecdotal stories from clergy friends tell a similar story to my own: the urge is to curl up and mask the misery with binge marathons of Netflix box sets. But this brings only short-term relief. A cursory look at social media posts show that a good number of vicars are struggling to keep it together. 

The pressures on vicars come from every quarter. Some vicars have been landed with the impossible task of maintaining empty churches as elderly volunteers withdraw to shield or isolate. I know one vicar who seems to have doubled up as a cleaner, flower captain, gardener, painter and a handyman, up ladders fixing broken windows. The likelihood is that community projects in some churches, food banks for example, are being carried by the incumbent alone. This is a recipe for burnout.

The liturgical and worship element of our vocation is also vastly reduced. Even those of us who are keen on keeping public worship going know that the majority of our flock are reluctant to leave home. An enormous amount of energy in committee meetings was given last year to make churches and worship Covid compliant to the gold standard. These hallowed places are more sterile than any Silicon Valley microchip factory. Yet despite churches being relatively safe, attendance remains low. I don't blame those who would rather stay at home, of course. But it's still disheartening to see so few turn up.

For many vicars like me, morale is further dented by a suspicion that theological absolutes – those things that make up the core beliefs of a Christian – are being forgotten in response to the pandemic. I grew up being told that Holy Communion contained a supernatural presence like nothing on earth. When Covid arrived at our shores, the deeper magic (to paraphrase C S Lewis) of the Eucharist seemed to count for nothing. I have been told that even giving the Last Rites could be a safety issue. Gone also is the notion that our churches are 'thin places' that straddle this world and the next. The drive to make our churches clean is understandable. Yet I fear the metaphysics of the Christian faith have been lost. Hardly anyone seems to care. I could cry.

The irony for me is that the push from the bishops for a digital church should be exciting for a former IT teacher like me. Many of us vicars have invested a lot of time in trying to do this well. But three lockdowns later and it is clear that fewer services are happening online. The fizz has gone out of this. The novelty has been lost. There is an uptake on using Zoom for some meetings, but unlike live streamed services on social media these are effectively limited to congregants. The danger is that the church closes in on itself and becomes a comfortable online holy club. It's hard for newcomers to get a look in.

Clergy are by nature a sensitive bunch absorbing the worries of our flock. And here I struggle. How are we to cope with congregants who question how the parish financial black hole is to be plugged and think that churches will be turned into flats? 

Looking at the wider community, I feel impotent to help those who are struggling with the reality of the situation we find ourselves in. Businesses have gone bankrupt, a year of education wiped out, jobs gone – and, of course, lives lost. There will come a time when the pandemic is over, but those of us who have lost loved ones or their livelihoods may never truly be able to move on.

I do my best to help those in need. There is only so much vicars can do at the end of a phone though. I want to be released into the community; restrictions make that almost impossible. I begin to question my purpose as a priest in the new normal.

Beyond all this, there is the all pervasive fear of death in this country. Dying is surely our last remaining taboo; it is a subject people just do not speak about. Yet beneath that reticence, there is deep anxiety: many of us are afraid of what contracting Covid might mean. I cling to my Christian hope that death has 'lost its sting'. But for others, there is no such relief. The church should be doing much more to reach these people by speaking emphatically and positively about death as a part of life.

Perhaps I need to take some perspective. The church has lived through worse crises than this one. It will survive. Let's hope the words of T S Eliot from ‘The Rock’ ring true.

The British race assured of a mission

Performed it, but left much at home unsure.

Of all that was done in the past, you eat the fruit, either rotten or ripe.

And the Church must be forever building, and always decaying, and always being restored.