June 4, 2020
Dear friends in Christ,
Tomorrow, June 5th, is the day that our governor has declared the counties of our diocese will open under the green phase of the Commonwealth’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. We all thank God that we are making clear progress in combatting the illness, reducing rates of infection, and slowly moving toward a “new normal.” Restaurants, businesses and other places of public gathering will be allowed to relax certain restrictions, while maintaining clear practices of masking, social distancing and sanitation.
I rejoice with you all in this development, and I pray that this trend will continue. As a community of congregations, we in the Diocese of Pittsburgh must do our part to protect our members, their families and neighborhoods, by continuing to observe proven protocols.
This means that we all still must be very careful. For our diocese, in this case, “green” does not actually mean “go.” The Committee on Emergency Preparedness and Response has reviewed our guidelines for re-opening, and we believe they still apply. All the precautions that have governed our lives as churches during the “yellow” phase need to be in place for the foreseeable future, with gradual adjustments according to the capacity and needs of local communities. Masking and distancing, restrictions on the number of people present, on whether and how we sing, how we pray, how the Eucharist is celebrated and made available, indeed who can come and who must stay at home, all need to continue.
I know this is frustrating. It is not easy being green, especially when it looks a lot like yellow. We all want to be together again as soon as possible. It seems unfair, as well, that many other churches are open while ours remain under restriction. I assure you this is not an arbitrary decision. Many of our churches are small, many of our members are at high risk due to age and other conditions, while a few of our congregations and buildings are larger and church leaders have to navigate complex needs among many groups. Your clergy and vestries are working collaboratively to develop the best possible plan for re-opening in your particular context, and the work is going well. I have already endorsed several of these plans, and many others are in the pipeline. I anticipate that we will see some steps toward implementing these plans, on a parish-by-parish basis, in the not too distant future. So, as I have asked before, now I ask again, please be patient, care for one another, and rejoice in each step forward as we make progress together.
I want to close with a word of exhortation. In the last week, with the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, an unarmed black man killed by a white police officer, we have found ourselves thrown into a world of anger, grief and chaos. The veil over our divisions has been stripped away, and the evils of racism fully exposed. As I said in my letter earlier this week, we are now confronted with the question that faces every convicted heart: What shall we then do?
I believe this time of pandemic is giving us unique gifts that God will use to help us all answer this question. We have been pushed beyond our accustomed boundaries. We have reached out into the world by electronic means and made connections we never imagined, creating communities we never thought possible. Now we must catch hold of these learnings and mobilize them to fight the virus of racism, to look at white behavior and repent, to build bridges of relationship between whites and people of color, praying for the instruments to build a more just and merciful world, that God’s will may be done on earth as it is in heaven. Let us begin this work now, while we are still under the harness of self-restraint, while our focus is sharpened to imagine what could be, and while our hands are full of unusual means to make it so. Let us resolve to meet those we have never met, get to know those we have never seen, listen to voices we have never heard, then keep walking with them. And see what God will do.
Faithfully your bishop,
(The Right Reverend) Dorsey W.M. McConnell, D.D.
VIII Bishop of Pittsburgh