WINTER IS COMING

Tulsa Mayor Wants Tighter Virus Rules After Megachurch Event

One church official was defensive: “God is a god of healing and not of sickness, so therefore when the spirit is there, I believe that there is no sickness there,” he said.

Widely-circulated video of a 2,500-person concert “demonstrates the limitations” of the COVID-19 rules in Tulsa “and the need to amend them,” the city’s mayor, G.T. Bynum, said on Thursday.

Bynum’s statements came after Pastor Paul Daugherty, of Victory Church, posted images of the event, essentially a concert held by affiliates of a controversial, virus-plagued California church called Bethel, online. One attendee, Jamison Reed, told local reporters that he opted not to wear a mask to the event because it was encouraged, not required, and that if that had been different, he would have worn one.

Victory Church Director of Operations Daniel Henshaw said the church will be shielded from a superspreader cluster resulting from the event because “I believe that where the spirit is, God is a god of healing and not of sickness, so therefore when the spirit is there, I believe that there is no sickness there.”