Video link church services are not an adequate substitute for physical gatherings

I have no connection with Tandragee, or Tandragee Baptists, or Baptists of any kind. But I have to express my profound disagreement with the views of Ivan Foster as set out in your Tuesday edition.

(‘Baptist pastor’s reasons for defying Covid indoor church ban are not solid,’ December 8).

I see absolutely no reason to condemn those who met for public worship on December 6. Provided they were using hand sanitiser, wearing masks and observing an appropriate distance they were only doing what had been permitted a couple of weeks previously and was soon to be permitted again.

Mr Foster is entitled to believe that video link church services are an adequate substitute for physical gatherings, but most of us know that he’s wrong about this. As for meeting in the open air, I don’t think that would have been such a good idea on that freezing day.

He seems to be saying that as the New Testament pattern was one of house churches, it was misguided for the Tandragee Baptists to insist on meeting in a public space.

Surely Mr Foster can’t be suggesting they should have met in a private house, where the chances of infection would have been much greater!

I’m not at all trying to underplay the seriousness of the virus in the case of some of those who are infected, or the need to take sensible precautions. But let’s be under no misapprehension: using the pretext of the public health emergency the state has begun to throw its weight around, and we’re all feeling the impact of this.

It is going to get worse before it gets better. There may be a lot of talk about human rights but we have been deprived of our human liberties.

Those who try to engage in peaceful protest are bundled into police vehicles. We are no longer a free people.

Stephen Richards, Ballymena

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