Streaming with Laughter… the quest for the funniest online service fails

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Spotted a streaming service fail? Nominate your best entry for our Streaming with Laughter poll.

Ever since Revd Stephen Beach of St Budeaux, Plymouth (below), got a bit too cosy with some church candles during an ‘online worship experience’, and his jumper was set alight – ‘Oh dear! I’ve just caught fire!’ he mildly exclaimed – churches around the world have been posting some spectacular streaming service fails during lockdown.

That’s why we’re asking our readers to send us the funniest online church gaffes, which we’ll run in a readers’ poll later this year. Please join us in our quest to discover the best ‘Streaming with Laughter’ moment from church during lockdown.

Scroll down to nominate a clip!

It’s been wonderful to see how willing local churches have been to embrace online church during a very difficult year. Despite some embarrassing, perilous, and downright hilarious moments, church leaders have been willing to take risks, make mistakes, and then, very sportingly, post them online for the rest of us to enjoy. Our poll will celebrate that.

Some of the best examples sent in so far have included a tree falling onto the worship group drummer (above) in the First Church of the Nazarene in Marietta, Georgia. The drummer heroically engaged in extended combat with the foliage to continue playing.

Meanwhile, Father Paolo Longo, a priest at the Church of San Pietro and San Benedetto di Polla in Salerno, Italy (above), forgot to turn off the augmentation filters on his Facebook livestream during Mass. As a result, he appeared to online worshippers wearing, in turn, a space helmet, a Blues Brothers hat and sunglasses, and two arms pumping iron.

Finally, the Dean of Canterbury Cathedral, the Very Revd Dr Robert Willis (above), was in the middle of leading a thoughtful meditation in his garden, when a cat disappeared up his cassock.

If you’ve seen an online church service fail to rival these, and which you’d like to nominate for our Streaming with Laughter poll, please send us the details below. Thanks!

Nominate a clip!

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