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COVID Crisis and churches moving online – will it hasten the consumerism and commercialization of religion in Protestantism? A Sociological and Theological analysis

A consequence of Protestantism‟s aversion to monopolistic religious control is the sprouting and growth of unorganized religious establishment by enterprising individuals in Protestantism. This aversion is justified within the context of a reformed understanding of anthropology in a twofold manner. Firstly, that the corruption in human nature makes power concentrations dangerous. Secondly to prevent human beings from slacking in their duty that arise due to human weaknesses, Adam Smith‟s idea of competitive religious markets perform better than ones where there is monopolistic control. While Protestant theology insulates us from the dangers of power concentration and slothful duty that stem from weakness in human nature, it opens us out to new problems such as consumerism, commercialization and commodification of Christianity. With the dawn of the COVID crisis and most churches and ministries being forced to move online for broadcast and connectivity, the issues of commercialization and consumerism in religion will find new avenues for manifestation. The subject of this article is to extract wisdom and strategies to deal with the same from the early church which was placed in a very similar context of commercialization and commodification of religion.