How Irish clergy and faith leaders are dealing with the pandemic

A new survey of clergy, ministers and faith leaders in Ireland by Dr Gladys Ganiel has some surprising findings about online religious practice.

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Across Ireland, church buildings now lie empty almost all the time due to Government restrictions on public gatherings during the Covid-19 pandemic. But a new survey of faith leaders in Ireland reveals there has been a surprising increase in online religious practice during the pandemic. People are praying more – and faith leaders and communities are showing remarkable resilience in the face of unprecedented challenges.

I developed the survey in partnership with the Irish Council of Churches/Irish Inter-Church Meeting. It was distributed to more than 2,000 clergy, ministers and faith leaders, north and south, via direct email and there were 439 responses between May 6th and 22nd May.

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Article originally appeared on RTE Brainstorm. 

Posted by Professor Gladys Ganiel

Gladys Ganiel is a Professor in the School of Social Sciences, Education and Social Work and a Research Fellow in the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice. Gladys works across the disciplines of sociology, politics, anthropology and religious studies. She specialises in religion, conflict transformation and reconciliation in Northern Ireland, Zimbabwe and South Africa; the emerging church movement; evangelicalism; and religious change on the island of Ireland.

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.