‘We feel a sense of freedom’: Easter Sunday brings worshipers out in person and in hope

As they carried beach chairs onto the grassy baseball diamond, Christ Church parishioners in South Philadelphia came to set up for Easter Sunday services — not for opening day.

Hope filled the cool April air, under a sky that turned sunny just as morning services began.

“Anyone trying to not feel what’s been going on the last year? Through retail therapy, or binge-watching Netflix or work?” asked Christ Church pastor Jeff Boettcher to the outdoor crowd of just under 100.

He wore a plain linen blazer and a red mask, and his wife, Angelica, and three children faced the stage, sometimes standing to sing, or sitting on a picnic blanket. Toddlers played in the dust of the pitcher’s mound at Edward O’Malley Athletic facility just west of I-95, which the church borrowed for Easter. An elderly woman in a wheelchair sipped grape juice, served in place of ceremonial wine, from a thimble-sized plastic cup.

For at least a year, church members around Greater Philadelphia worshiped mainly online, cut off from in-person services, meeting through electronic screens.

Finally, on Easter Sunday 2021, the faithful came together in real life.

“There’s something special about being under the sky, right?” Boettcher said with a smile. Christ Church held services outdoors under I-95 at Front and Moore Streets from July until November.

“It certainly was loud,” said Rob Pina, Sunday director and a South Philly resident. “But we met under I-95 all summer long.”

Across the river in Camden, the Rev. Keith D. Dickens addressed his Parkside United Methodist Church congregation in person this Easter, preaching hope, with a dash of cautious optimism and healthy worship.

“Now there’s hope, and we are people of faith,” he said. “We believe we trust God and pray, practicing social distancing, wearing masks, washing hands and getting vaccinated.”

Dickens counts himself as one of many Black pastors around the country urging a sometimes reluctant flock to get COVID-19 vaccines.

“We lead by example. There’s a lot of mistrust, given the Tuskegee experiments and the discrimination in the medical community,” he said in an interview. “That’s slowly starting to change.”

Priests and laypeople around the region and the country faced the fact that buildings literally “were not the church in 2020. Instead, we are the church,” Dickens said of his flock.

“We stayed in contact the last many months virtually, through Facebook Live and YouTube, our website, emails, phone calls, sending cards.”

Parkside United Methodist has registered as a vaccine provider, Dickens said, starting next month.

“We’re working with Area Health Education Centers, partnering through a grant to be a vaccine site,” he said. The first vaccine date, open to the public, is scheduled for May 22, and another for June 10. To register, visit Parkside United Methodist Church’s website or contact outreach minister Roxanne Hedgespeth by email at roxspeth@comcast.net.

Sermons on social justice also made their way into the liturgy Sunday.

Christ Church’s Boettcher, who is also chaplain to the Philadelphia Phillies, founded the reformed Baptist congregation five years ago, and moved from South Jersey to Center City specifically to attract a diverse group of churchgoers.

“We prayed for diversity, for dollars and for discipleship,” said his wife. “Even before last year’s racial unrest, we prayed for a diverse congregation. The church should reflect God’s heart. He made people of every color and age.”

“So much of life was stripped away this past year,” Angelica Boettcher added. “COVID showed us there’s more than this life.”

In his sermon Sunday, Dickens also recalled the words of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., assassinated on the same date 53 years ago.

“In the midst of a pandemic, hatred against women, against children at the border, attacks against Asian Americans, and racial discrimination against African Americans, will you follow Jesus all the way? And love all people as your neighbor?” he asked the crowd.

On that ballfield, Christ Church member Arthur Robinson reflected on a year of loss and suffering — and on what remained unshaken.

“Spiritually, people haven’t lost faith,” he said, eyeing all those around him on blankets and beach chairs at the athletic complex.

John Carlson, another parishioner who runs Hope House, a faith-based recovery program and shelter in South Philadelphia, agreed that “people are beat up. They felt hopeless being trapped indoors. Last year we didn’t know what we were walking into. Now there’s a light of hope. The vaccines are out. People are gathering.”

Carlson recently lost an aunt and an uncle in their 80s to COVID-19. And yet, he said, “Today, we feel a sense of freedom. There’s a stronger sense of faith and hope.”