Dispute over drive-in church calls out for compromise

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 01/12/2020 (1442 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Pandemic restrictions on Manitoba churches are severe, of that there is no question. But are they fair?

That is certainly the question many Manitobans are asking after provincial public health officials decided that drive-in religious services are not permitted under code-red restrictions.

At churches, both south of Steinbach and in Winnipeg, parking lots were repurposed so worshippers could remain in their cars and still attend services.

At first blush, it seemed like a reasonable compromise. But Dr. Brent Roussin, Manitoba’s chief public health officer, disagreed. He made it clear drive-in church services are included in the ban on indoor and outdoor public gatherings. His main fear was that people from multiple households would travel together in the same vehicle to attend services.

By offering that opinion, Roussin demonstrates an undeniable lack of faith in some of the people who organize and attend faith-based services. His concerns are not entirely unwarranted; there is an epidemiological relationship between some faith-based groups, their disdain for things like social distancing or the wearing of non-medical masks, and a strong belief that the risks associated with COVID-19 are not significant.

This dynamic is certainly part of the narrative of the Church of God Restoration, which has held indoor and outdoor drive-in services in contravention of public health orders. This congregation not only wants to meet in person for services, it also wants to be free from masks and social distancing largely because it does not believe COVID-19 is a real threat.

We’ve seen the same phenomenon in other jurisdictions where faith-based gatherings have been identified as a major source of COVID-19 infections. That’s partly due to the length of religious services and the predisposition of worshippers to ignore public health advice.

To date, only the Springs Church on Lagimodiere Boulevard has followed the Church of God Restoration by holding drive-in services. Many of the other large evangelical churches have pledged to respect public health orders, even if they are similarly frustrated by what appears to be a double standard.

Even non-worshippers could afford a small measure of sympathy here. Just as it is impossible to deny the connection between some faith-based groups and a rejection of basic pandemic-control measures, it is similarly impossible to ignore the fact there are huge gatherings of cars in big-box retail parking lots. Or, the decision by provincial health officials to allow alcohol and cannabis to be sold while churches stand empty.

Again, public health officials have a rationale for these decisions. In terms of big-box retailers, the biggest crowds of parked cars are outside stores that have been deemed essential. As for alcohol and cannabis retailers, there is an implied theory that ending the sale of those two controlled substances would be bad for the health of people who may suffer from withdrawal.

Those are not arguments that play well in the evangelical community, but they do reflect a pragmatic approach. The bigger legal question is whether these double standards and the rationale behind them are legally sustainable.

Springs Church announced Wednesday it is seeking an injunction to the Manitoba prohibition on drive-in church services. It will argue it is illegal to prohibit church-goers from gathering in their cars to worship when the same threat that Roussin identified — people from multiple households arriving in the same car — is posed by vehicles gathering in the parking lots of big-box retailers.

A news release from Springs Church said it had attempted to find a compromise by reaching out directly to Health Minister Cameron Friesen “but our efforts… have failed.”

The legal approach here is not dissimilar to that taken in a recent U.S. Supreme Court case on restrictions imposed by New York State on faith-based gatherings. In a controversial decision last week, the court issued a 5-4 decision that struck down those restrictions. Social conservatives celebrated the decision as evidence U.S. President Donald Trump’s new, right-leaning high court was tipping the legal scales in favour of religious principles. Legal experts have taken a more sober tack.

Former judge and Stanford Law School Prof. Michael McConnell and Max Raskin, an adjunct law professor at New York University, noted in a New York Times commentary that SCOTUS was reacting less to an ideological or religious question, and more to the fact that the restrictions were “extraordinarily tight and essentially unexplained.”

Here in Manitoba, there’s no question the province has the legal authority to suspend our constitutional rights. There’s also no question the restrictions Roussin has put in place are tight. However, there may still be some question about whether they have been explained in terms that make them legally justifiable.

It is unfortunate that Friesen, or Premier Brian Pallister for that matter, could not work directly with churches to find a compromise to the drive-in service stalemate. Perhaps there is a way church leaders could demonstrate they can live within both the spirit and letter of public health orders by limiting vehicles to passengers from a single household.

But for a compromise to take place, both sides have to be willing to give a little. Those churches that continue to reject basic pandemic control measures on principle will not only deny themselves the opportunity for drive-in services, they will likely deny them to other churches as well.

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca