By Brian Dryden, Canadian Catholic News

[Ottawa – CCN] – The Catholic Church in Canada has had no choice but to go online to maintain a connection to the faithful ever since the COVID-19 pandemic prompted health authorities to enact strict guidelines that banned all large public gatherings across the country in an effort to stop the spread of the deadly virus

With Catholic churches closed to the public across the country, the Church has become a virtual experience in recent weeks. As provincial governments and health authorities start the long and slow process of easing some of those restrictions on the everyday life of Canadians, the need of the Catholic Church to go online may prove to have a positive long-term impact on spiritual life in in the country.

“Whenever you have a disruption to everyday life you have innovation happening that adjusts to the situation and faith communities are no different,” said Ray Pennings, executive vice-president of the Ottawa-based religious think tank Cardus.

“Some of that fades away after the crisis passes and things go back to how they were always done before, but some of that innovation stays and becomes how things are going forward,” he said.

“Some of those changes, for businesses and I’m sure for faith communities as well, can open up new ways of doing things that have a long-term impact,” Pennings said. “It is forcing a rethink of what do they do put online and what they don’t and it will result in innovations that continue.”

The BC Catholic newspaper recently quoted the vocations director for the Archdiocese of Vancouver Father Paul Goo as saying he would never have thought of holding Mass online before the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It’s something I would not have considered before this crisis,” said Father Goo, adding that the COVID-19 outbreak “is forcing people to think creatively and come up with new ways we haven’t really considered before.”

Winnipeg Archbishop Richard Gagnon, who is president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB), said that face-to-face interaction with parishioners is vital to how the Catholic Church operates, but he can see how some of the innovations within the Church across the country can augment how individual dioceses engage with parishioners in the future.

“I think using technology will always be secondary to the face-to-face aspect of gathering together as a spiritual community,” Archbishop Gagnon told the Canadian Catholic News. “But I think we are going to see that some of the creative ways that some of our churches are adopting and using technology is a positive and will be useful in the future.”

The CEO of an American-based faith consulting organization posted on the Covergence website that the COVID-19 pandemic will have a lasting impact on how faith communities function in the future. “Church leaders across the nation have discovered the power of technology to connect with people through worship services, small group studies, pastoral care conversations, council meetings, and meditation groups,” Rev. Cameron Trimble, CEO of Convergence, posted on a blog. “The gift of COVID-19 is that it has catapulted the Church into the technological era, awakening us to ways that we can offer good, wise theology into a world that needs it.”

When churches will be able reopen in the Catholic Archdiocese of Ottawa remains an open question, the diocese’s communications director Robert Du Broy said. When asked if some of the “virtual church” additions to the diocese’s website could become ongoing features of the Church’s outreach in Ottawa in the future, he said “absolutely.”

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