Research: British Ritual Innovation under COVID-19 (BRIC-19)

Understanding how Britain’s religious communities adapted during — and responded to — the COVID-19 pandemic.

Research summary

1 August 2020 to 30 September 2021

The project Social Distance, Digital Congregation: British Ritual Innovation under COVID-19 (BRIC-19) captured and analysed how the pandemic impacted the ways that religious communities across Britain came together for ritual worship. To understand the consequences of these changes, the project looked at the ways religious communities are organised and controlled.

Before the pandemic, in-person worship was an essential part of most religious communities. Regular rituals and holidays built a sense of connection, and gave members comfort, hope, resilience and stability.

Lockdown restrictions meant these rituals were no longer possible. What were the clergy to do? In a way, they became performance artists — forced to make do with the tools around them in order to serve the needs of the religious public.

The BRIC-19 project included:

a large-scale survey of religious congregants and leaders
an action research group of clergy and other religious professionals
a set of 15 case studies, including a Birmingham mosque, a London Buddhist temple, digital memorialisation, Black-majority churches, the development of virtual pilgrimage, and changes in funerals and death care

Digital worship opened up new possibilities for exploring new religious experiences. It gave access to those who could not — or did not — feel comfortable attending a place of worship in person. Systems of religious authority were disrupted too. People became more conscious in seeking out religious communities that served their needs.

However, the lack of face-to-face contact was felt as a tremendous loss. Online rituals were generally seen as less effective, less spiritual and communal than the traditional counterparts. The project explored ways that the loss could be mitigated but, overall, the trend was downward.

The new techniques developed during the pandemic seem to be here to stay in one form or another. The vast majority of the clergy surveyed said they will continue to use methods they had learned during COVID-19 once the crisis is over.

Understanding the effect of the changes is necessary, so that new techniques can be developed and used more effectively in the future.

Since the publication of the report, public interest and conversation with faith groups, interfaith dialogue partners and the religious press is ongoing.

The project was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council as an emergency COVID-19 response.

Research outputs

A final project report
A project website, with a series of research updates
A podcast interview
An audio documentary focusing on the death care case study
Media coverage in TV, radio and local papers
Discussions with religious professionals adapting to the changing place of religious life, such as the Synagogue Tech team