Church Fragmentation And The Pandemic. Analysis Of Four Eastern Christian Groups In Ukraine

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted religious rituals and traditional ways of gathering in various religious groups worldwide. Some of them voluntarily reduced religious services, while others were forced to do so under lockdown restrictions imposed by national and local governments. Thanks to these new practices of ministry, the pandemic exposed previous problems in the church that existed in hidden forms, and revealed new trends. Additionally, all believers and ministers had to show flexibility and coordinate a common response, at least at the parish level, to understand the new demands of service and spiritual life. This allowed us, within the framework of this study, to monitor certain socio-religious trends that reflect both general social changes and the purely ecclesiastical environment of Ukrainian Orthodoxy. For example, responses to the pandemic were conservative until the entire vertical of the church hierarchy decided how to address the crisis. This, in turn, gave rise to a number of creative solutions at the local level, which reflects manifestations of grassroots democracy and is especially interesting in the context of future changes in the Orthodox environment.