While many have suggested that churches are especially susceptible to coronavirus infections and would put their entire communities at risk by continuing to meet, the figures are now in. States that forbade (and/or still forbidding) public worship gatherings have suffered far worse infection rates than states who made religious exemptions.
Pew Research Center has analyzed all the data from various directives, decrees, and executive orders related to public gathering bans and have provided a map of states based upon religious exemptions to the lockdowns.
You might notice something surprising about the map.
States neglecting to consider First Amendment liberties were Washington, Montana, Idaho, California, Alaska, Minnesota, Illinois, New York, Vermont, and New Jersey.
States reeling from coronavirus include New York and New Jersey (both banned worship), comprising the bulk of coronavirus infections in the United States. Washington, which led infections and deaths early in the ‘pandemic’ also banned worship. Illinois was in the top four. Minnesota also had surprisingly high infections.
Twenty-one states placed some restrictions on religious gatherings, related to the size of the crowd worshipping. Nearly a third of the states placed no restrictions on congregation size. These states, statistically, are fairing far better on average.
An anti-religious bigotry and secular zealotry have gripped the nation, spreading the propaganda that Christian worshippers would be the death of their communities. Factually, it does not hold up.
