’Quarantainment.’ How one Columbus couple is keeping locals connected to church
A Columbus couple’s idea to pass time during this time of social distancing and quarantine has become a way to share their faith while providing a daily dose of “quarantainment” to others.
Rick and Marquette McKnight have been sharing hymns during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic by posting online videos created by Marquette of Rick playing hymns on the piano at their Columbus home.
“I said why don’t you play something and I’ll videotape you on my phone and we’ll post it on Facebook,” Marquette McKnight said. “(I told him to play) a hymn that most people would recognize.” She added the hashtag “quarantainment” and it stuck.
Rick McKnight said it is a way to share with others something that’s important to them, and said it’s miraculous people are finding comfort in the hymns. He said many of the hymns are old, what he describes as “Sunday night hymns.”
“It takes people back, provides comfort and takes them to a time that was simpler and not so frightening,” he said.
The McKnights expanded the idea by hosting a live HymnSing on Easter Sunday. They partnered with their church, St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Columbus, where Rick is the organist and choirmaster. The HymnSing was live on the church’s Facebook page.
Rick said as he walked to the piano to begin, he looked outside and saw several cars parked in front of their home. In those cars where choir members from St. Thomas. They had come to join in from a safe distance.
“It was just fantastic, it was a huge surprise,” McKnight said. “I think that what we’ve discovered in all of this is that people want to be with each other, they crave being with each other, the interactions, and that’s what’s been great for us because Facebook and Instagram and anything are responsive mediums and we can talk back to folks.”
“Everybody who’s a Christian, who celebrates Easter at church, everybody’s missing church and we’re missing that connection to that space we call sacred and to the people, and the music, and the God that we worship,” Marquette said.
She said during this time of social distancing, it’s a nice way to reconnect with people through common music. “It’s a different kind of connection and it’s not something that anybody wants to sustain,” she said, “ but for here and now it’s what we have and it helps us to connect with that outer world, those people who are outside the door.”
