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As Christians, we understand the importance of in-person worship. As APNs, we know how serious COVID-19 is.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is taking a toll on Christian publishing companies. The publishing arms of the nation’s two largest Protestant denominations—the Southern Baptist Con­vention and the United Methodist Church—both announced staff cuts at the end of April as a result of the virus.

The United Methodist Publishing House will lay off about 70 of its 296 employees in June. The Southern Baptist Convention’s LifeWay Christian Re­sources started reducing staff on May 1, in addition to implementing hiring and salary freezes and cutbacks.

In a conference room in Washington, D.C., a dozen epidemiologists huddle over a computer monitor. On the screen, a map of self-reported data from test labs around the world shows a lethal strain of avian influenza originating in Asia.

President Trump’s job approval ratings among some faith groups jumped in March as the number of coronavirus infections began to spread across the country.

But that “Trump bump” has all but disappeared.

A new poll released on April 30 from the Public Religion Research Institute shows Trump’s approval has fallen on average by 6 percentage points and is now more in keeping with 2019 levels among most demographic groups.

Gregg Mast, a renowned Reformed Church in America pastor and educator, died April 27 from complications related to COVID-19. He was 68.

Early in his ca­reer, Mast spent a year as an assistant pastor at a Dutch Re­formed Church in South Africa—at the height of apartheid. The experience stuck with him.

When people’s value is reduced to their economic contributions, they are dehumanized.

It may be Easter, but lament comes more readily than alleluia.

When local and state governments across the nation began instituting shelter-in-place policies back in March, there was immediate concern for the risk staying at home would pose for survivors of domestic violence.

Marianne Hester, a Bristol University sociologist who studies abusive relationships, told the Chicago Tribune that domestic violence goes up whenever families spend more time together—like during Christmas and summer vacations.

Indeed, many communities have observed an upswing in the number of reported domestic violence incidents.

The World Association for Christian Communication has launched a rapid response fund to help support grassroots community media outlets that provide accurate coronavirus-related information to vulnerable people who often cannot access mainstream media.

Louisiana authorities arrested a pastor on an assault charge on April 21 after he admitted that he drove his church bus toward a man who has been protesting his decision to continue holding mass gatherings at church in defiance of public health orders during the coronavirus pandemic.