“CHALLENGING, frustrating, enlightening and exhausting” are the words Niall Dunne chooses to describe the last year.

He and his young family moved from Barry in South Wales to Cornwall in May 2020, after Niall had taken up a position as worship leader at St Martin’s Church in Liskeard in January.

Niall, 37, and his wife Hannah, a photographer, have three children: Edie, 10, Micah, six, and Elijah, two.

As part of the Corish Times’ interviews and coverage looking back over the last 12 months of the lockdowns, Niall describes how the pandemic has affected his faith, and how the church responded with new ways to worship.

“I remember first hearing about the virus on the news in January 2020, and, honestly, not having any thought that it would affect us in the UK. In hindsight, it would have been really helpful to have known what was to come, in order to prepare. But equally, if we had known more in the weeks and months leading up to the first lockdown, I think people’s anxiety would have been through the roof.

My job is to facilitate worship happening in the church. Almost all of this would have been reliant on people gathering. So when we went into the first lockdown, we had find the best ways possible to help people connect with each other and to worship. And quickly. All that is available with technology has been incredible during this time.

I don’t think there are any substitutes for being with people in person, but we have managed to stay connected in ways that didn’t exist 10 years ago.

Like many, Hannah and I had to try and balance working from home with, not only childcare, but home-schooling, and like many….. we have struggled! I think too of the social interactions our children, and so many others, have missed over the last year, from play dates to toddler groups. But there have been some family times we wouldn’t have had without lockdown, that have hopefully been good for our family dynamic (as well as making us extremely grateful for our kids’ teachers!!).

I think for us as a church, the hardest thing has been not being able to gather and sing for worship. But there were some points over the last year, where we were allowed to sing outside (with other Covid restrictions in place), and these times were very special. We organized two big drive-in church services with other churches in Liskeard, and hundreds of people turned up to sing together. It was a welcome relief for people to be able to gather. It showed me just how important gathering is.

We weren’t able to do much in the building at Christmas time, so we spent a couple of weeks going into different neighbourhoods in Liskeard and had short, fun carol services with the residents. Again it was well received, as it was something that could bring people together safely.

They say necessity breeds creativity, and we’ve certainly experienced that this year. Through the challenge, pain and even loss, we’ve had to find ways to stay connected as a church.

Interestingly, I think there have been some really positive effects of the last year on my faith. I am someone who loves being part of drawing people together to sing and worship, which is why I do the job I do! But the challenge this last year is how to worship, when those opportunities just aren’t there in the same way. At first this was really difficult, but having gone through a pain barrier with it, I think it really strengthened my faith, and made it more real. I think that the common theme for us as a church has been: how do we grow in our faith, as a church and as individuals, in a time like this. We’re still on that journey.

I have no doubt that more people have become interested in faith through this time. We’ve seen many more people interested in what we’re doing here, and I suppose everything being visible online has really helped that. We’ve run two online Alpha courses (introduction to Christianity) and had a good response to them. I have seen neighbours very receptive and interested in what the church is doing. But equally, there is a rise in questions and doubt, for Christians and people of other faiths, or no religious faith at all. And it’s important that we can all honestly question things – actually it’s necessary for faith to be real. So we recognise our job as a church is to offer an ear and a hand as people do that, but to be honest about who we are and what we believe too.

One thing I think we have done pretty well as a worship team in St Martin’s, is find ways of the team participating together to lead our congregation in worship. Whether this is pre-recorded videos, or livestreamed services, or teams going out to sing carols in the community, the team has wanted to be involved and helped find ways to do so.

As a musician, I’ve really missed live music. Over the last year, one really fun thing we’ve done with my family (who live in different parts of the UK) is have a weekly zoom catch up, where we each share a YouTube clip of some live music. It’s been really fun to have a common goal in our zooms and listen to each other’s music, but of course as a result we’ve had fun and laughed together too – something we’ve all needed!

Another thing we did for a while as a church is organize a big weekly livestreamed quiz on Facebook. We’d often get 60 or 70 people joining live and commenting. It was great fun, again, often exactly what we all needed.

Obviously I cannot wait for the opportunity to gather properly in person. I really hope we will recognise what a privilege it is to do so, and we’ll be grateful for it, rather than taking it for granted. But I do hope that the lessons we’ve learnt over the last year will stay with us. I don’t want to lose the flair and inspiration for creativity that has come about through lockdown. I don’t want us to lose the deepening of faith that has happened in many.

All that said, I really do look forward to the day we can all sing together during worship – I think it will be done with a new sense of hope and appreciation.

Look out for more interviews and reflections in Part 3 of our Life in Lockdown series - in this week’s edition of The Cornish Times, out tomorrow.