U.s. Churches’ Response to Covid-19: Results from Facebook

Abstract: For religious organizations, in-person gatherings are at the heart of their activities, yet they have been identified as some of the early hot spots of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. This study investigates U.S. churches' response to the pandemic by looking at their public Facebook activity. The share of churches that offer an online church activity on a given Sunday more than doubled within two weeks at the beginning of the pandemic and stayed well above baseline levels. Online church activities are positively correlated with the local pandemic situation at the beginning, but uncorrelated with most state interventions. We investigate heterogeneity in the church responses and find that church size and worship style explain differences consistent with churches facing different demand and cost structures. Local voting behavior, on the other hand, explains little of the variation, suggesting that decisions to move online are not reflective of partisan politics.