THE NATURE, IMPACTS, CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS OF RESTRICTION ON CHILDREN’S PARTICIPATION IN CHURCH ACTIVITIES DURING THE COVID-19 LOCKDOWN IN IBADAN, NIGERIA

Abstract

COVID-19 is a global pandemic that has shaken every continent of the world, irrespective of scientific and medical sophistication. The high mortality rate associated with the pandemic is a testament to its ravaging nature. Previous studies on COVID-19 were devoted to investigating its medical history diagnosis, effects and methods of preventing and treating its victims, with little attention paid to how the pandemic necessitated the exclusion of children in church programmes in Ibadan, Nigeria. Therefore, this study investigates the challenges and prospects experienced in restricting children from church activities during the heat of the pandemic to describe the sociological implications for the Children‘s Department in Ibadan churches. George Berkeley‘s rule-consequentialist theory, which posits that an action is right as it conforms to a rule that leads to the greatest good theory, served as the theoretical framework. Data were obtained through telephone interviews and WhatsApp chats with ten teachers and 40 children who were purposively and randomly sampled from Children‘s Class Departments in the Living Faith Church Worldwide and Christ Apostolic Church, Oke Ife, Agbowo, Ibadan. The data were subjected to descriptively and ethical analysis. Most of our respondents reported protection from health risks, cohesion in family ties and stress reduction as the gains derived from the ban from the church. At the same time, loss of fellowship and spiritual backwardness were considered the setbacks brought about by their restriction from participating in church activities. However, the period provided an avenue for the church to utilise the resourcefulness of new media such as Facebook, WhatsApp, LinkedIn, YouTube, snapshot TikTok, Instagram, WeChat, QQ, Twitter, Pinterest, Agencies, Tumblr, Periscope, and Vimeo. All these are social networking, Microblogging, Photo sharing, and video sharing for liturgical purposes now and in the future. This calls for the strengthening of internet services across the country by the government through relevant agencies. This is considered the best way for churches to meet the growing needs of respective children‘s departments during or without the pandemic.