Earlier this week, I mentioned that a megachurch just outside downtown Charlotte, the United House of Prayer for all People, triggered a super spreader. The United House of Prayer’s yearly “holy convocation” in early October, held at their facility just north of downtown, has been directly linked to what has become the biggest coronavirus cluster in Charlotte since the pandemic began.
Well,it has became apparent that what passes for leadership at that church wasn’t willing to take even rudimentary steps to cooperate. Far from it—they were actually planning to hold another big event starting tomorrow. In response, county health officials went nuclear. They imposed a two-week ban on all in-person gatherings at the United House of Prayer’s three church facilities in Charlotte.
The United House of Prayer for All People on Beatties Ford Road had a week-long revival planned to begin Sunday and hadn’t committed to canceling the event, County Manager Dena Diorio said during a Saturday morning press conference.
Now officials have barred the church from holding in-person gatherings at its Mecklenburg County properties until at least Nov. 6.
Diorio said that she and other county officials had made “several attempts” to work with church officials, including offering to conduct testing at the church and requesting information from church leaders so they could conduct adequate contact tracing.
The abatement order, signed by county health director Gibbie Harris, details how county officials bent over backwards to work with the church. On Thursday, Harris wrote church officials asking for contact information for all those who attended the “holy convocation,” and also asked church officials to cooperate with officials and contact tracers from her department. She also asked church leaders to call off all in-person events until at least November 5, and limit all events after that to 25 people inside and 50 outside, with masks and social distancing required.
By then, county officials had linked 121 COVID cases to the United House of Prayer—118 in Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, plus an additional three in suburban Iredell and Cabarrus counties. Out of those cases, seven have been hospitalized, with a number of them on ventilators. At least three people have died, and a fourth death is being investigated for links to this super spreader.
You would have thought that presented with those numbers, the leadership at the United House of Prayer would have had the good sense to cooperate. But not only did they not respond, but they continued to push with plans for a “Whirlwind Revival” starting on Sunday. As a result, Harris and Diorio were left with no choice but to issue this order. Harris told WBTV in Charlotte that it’s only the third abatement order she’s ever had to issue in her entire 30-year career as a public health director—first in Wake County (Raleigh), Buncombe County (Asheville), and since 2017 here in Charlotte.
This really hits a raw nerve for me. I grew up mere minutes from this church. The thought that this could potentially affect people in my old neighborhood, including my mother, sends a chill down my spine. Moreover, this gathering drew people from both Carolinas, as well as Georgia, New Jersey and New York. So it’s a near-mathematical certainty that there are more than 121 positives linked to this super spreader. The thought that this church would willfully put this city, this neighborhood, in danger so soon after causing a super spreader is a personal insult. And in a majority-black area, when people of color have particularly been slammed by the rona?
There are already people screaming that county officials were trampling on this church’s First Amendment rights. Sorry, but they continued planning a big event even after being linked to a super spreader. The strongest protections of freedom of religion would not protect a church here—nor should they. Hell, if it were up to me, the leadership of this church would be in jail.