{"id":31703,"date":"2021-02-06T11:15:46","date_gmt":"2021-02-06T17:15:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/?p=31703"},"modified":"2021-04-28T18:47:17","modified_gmt":"2021-04-28T23:47:17","slug":"must-masks-be-worn-to-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/must-masks-be-worn-to-services\/","title":{"rendered":"Must masks be worn to services?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\t

Question:<\/h2>\n

Dear Brother Jeffrey,<\/p>\n

Where I live mask-wearing is mandatory in public spaces, schools, etc.\u00a0The men of the church in which I am a member have decided it’s optional to wear masks to worship and Bible classes. There are, of course, many of us who think this is a lawbreaking activity and it is dividing the Lord’s body. The argument is the government shouldn’t be able to tell us how to worship. I say wearing a mask is not telling us how to worship as I am just thankful to be able to gather at all. We have elderly members who cannot take the risk so one of the men has started a “mask only” service at 3:00 pm for the mask-wearing to worship at. My argument is this is not the church as it is only partial and the others do their own thing. It’s just a mess and pride is running the show.<\/p>\n

My question is how is any of this glorifying God?\u00a0 The whole region is under this law and what kind of example are we setting for our children? \u00a0The men took a vote to determine this optional mask status and then said it’s binding and I said you can’t bind that. Anyways I’m upset and trying to figure out how to reason with these men who “voted” to break the law?<\/p>\n\t

Answer:<\/h2>\n

A part of the problem is that a\u00a0lot<\/strong> of false information is being spread and the governments are involved.<\/p>\n

Wearing certain types of masks do slow down the spread of bacterial and viral diseases, but no mask prevents the spread of any disease. The cloth masks that everyone is wearing are not effective. “Cloth face masks have limited efficacy in combating viral infection transmission” [Suresh K. Sharma, “Efficacy of cloth face mask in prevention of novel coronavirus infection transmission: A systematic review and meta-analysis<\/a>“, CDC]. Why are they being mandated? Because people are convinced that some improvement is better than no improvement and because the leaders want to appear<\/em> to be doing something. This is why you see leaders issuing all sorts of mandates and then getting caught violating their own rules.<\/p>\n

It is because people know that false information is being spread and that the laws being issued are not effective that you run into the problem of what to do. As Christians, we obey the government (Romans 13:1-7), but there are limits. For example, I am not allowed to lie as a Christian, so when I see someone, including the government, spreading false information, I voice my disagreement. If the government issues a law saying we cannot sing in worship, as California infamously declared, I will ignore the rule.<\/p>\n

The current situation is that we have mandates being issued that are mostly for show. What do we do? We work to get the government to be reasonable while abiding by the rules as minimally as possible. I don’t know the exact wording where you are. The ones around here don’t require the constant wearing of masks and have exceptions.<\/p>\n

If you believe you should wear a mask, then do so. If your brother has reasons that he doesn’t wish to wear one, then that is between him, God, and the government. His lack of compliance has nothing to do with you, and it won’t make you more likely to catch a disease.<\/p>\n

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Additional References:<\/h2>\n

Since I originally wrote this answer, additional studies have come out that continue to demonstrate that cloth facemasks do not work.<\/p>\n