Anyone who has worked in a newsroom knows that journalists often have to study the equation 1+1+X=3 and then find the missing X factor that produces “what comes next.”

What am I talking about? Journalists look at one set of facts in the news. Then they study another set of facts that we tend to take for granted or that we have pushed onto the news back burner. When you pay attention to where the two sets of facts overlap — #BOOM — you can see potential headlines.

Right now, the coronavirus crisis is creating all kinds of overlapping sets of facts and many are life-and-death matters. This is shaping the headlines and this trend will only increase.

However, after all of the COVID-19 stories I’ve read in the past week (while 66-year-old me has faced my usual spring sinus woes), none has hit me harder than a Religion News Service essay — “Why mainline Protestants might fear COVID-19 the most” — by political scientist Ryan Burge (also a contributor here at GetReligion). It’s crucial that he is also the Rev. Ryan Burge. He teaches at Eastern Illinois University, but he also a minister in the American Baptist Churches USA. Here is the overture:

I walked through the doors of First Baptist Church of Mount Vernon, Illinois, a congregation that I’ve pastored for the last 13 years, and shook hands with the 91-year-old greeter. Afterward, she said to me, “I didn’t know if we should shake hands today.”

I hadn’t even thought about it, but I know that she had.

COVID-19 has now infected more than 100,000 people, killing 4,000 of them across the globe. But, one of the real curiosities is that the mortality rate is dramatically different based on age. The disease takes the life of nearly 15% of the people that it infects over the age of 80.

I find that to be incredibly cruel, especially for my mainline church that has been dwindling in size and increasing in age at a stunning rate. Of our 20 or so active members, four of them are over the age of 90. Another 10 are in their 80s. If COVID-19 becomes a true global pandemic, my church would likely not fare well.

That’s true for many of our mainline brothers and sisters as well.

Yes, that’s a very small congregation. However, it’s not unusual to see mainline congregations with 50 or fewer active members and many (some would say most) have declined to the point that they struggle to pay the salary and benefits of an ordained minister.

In recent years, some GetReligion readers have chided me when I refer to “mainline” Protestants as “oldline” Protestants. I have used this term (a) because mainline churches have declined to the point that they no longer — statistically — represent the “mainstream” of American religious life and (b) these denominations are getting older and older, in terms of the faithful in the pews.

Who are we talking about? Social scientists refer to these denominations as the “Seven Sisters” and they are (for now) the United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the Episcopal Church, the American Baptist Churches USA, the United Church of Christ and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

Old? How old? As always, Burge has turned some of the stats journalists need to know into a blunt chart:

Several years ago, I spoke to a rather typical group of Episcopalians in a church forum and I would estimate that roughly 75% of the people in the room were over 60 years of age.

I would love to see more nuanced statistics, at this point in time, because I suspect that the gold 36-64 years old band in the middle of that Burge chart leans toward the older end of that niche. Burge notes that the average Episcopalian is 59 years old. There are now three retired United Methodists for every member under the age of 35. More Burge:

Demography is destiny for many of these denominations. They will become dramatically smaller in the next two decades based on attrition alone, whether or not they are hit by COVID-19.

But if the disease can’t be curtailed, it could become a turning point for some of these denominations: Their houses of worship are prime targets for the spread of disease.

This passage hit me hard, as well:

Connection to their fellow members is especially important for older Americans. Data from Pew Research Center indicates that the average 80-year-old spends at least eight hours a day alone, double the time a 40-year-old does. For many of the older generation, the institutions that held society together for them during the formative years have already crumbled. One of the few things that has remained constant for them is their church home, seeing the same people in the same pews every Sunday, taking the bread and drinking from the cup the same way they have done for decades. They need that consistency and community — and COVID-19 might take that away from them.

Public officials say the next two weeks are crucial. I am not sure — looking at the global statistics — that things will stabilize that quickly. America is a nation that is rather spread out and we do not have as much mass transit as Europe. The virus may spread more slowly.

Then there is New York City and the powerful Acela Zone in the Northeast that tends to shape American news. For many reasons, I am watching what happens in New York.

So what does this oldline Protestant trend look like in a fresh headline? Here is a crucial story from the religion-news team at The Washington Post: “National Cathedral and hundreds of churches in Maryland, D.C., Virginia to close for two weeks.”

Here’s a crucial bite of information from Bishop Mariann Budde of Washington, D.C.

Budde, who is 60, noted that the Episcopal Church skews older, and leaders are particularly concerned about putting older members at risk. She said the decision wasn’t easy, especially with Easter coming up in a few weeks. But she’s hoping the two weeks off will allow priests to rest, remain healthy and focus on their community. …

Budde said the diocese plans to continue its social service plans for the needy, and is figuring out how to do that while protecting those served and volunteers. However, in general, “the expectation is that buildings will be closed and empty of people,” said National Cathedral spokesman Kevin Eckstrom.

I still think that reporters need to pay attention to coronavirus stories linked to America’s massive megachurches — most of which are Pentecostal and Evangelical Protestant.

However, Burge is absolutely right: There are painful realities that are hitting home for small churches from coast to coast, in every imaginable zip code. All the evidence suggests that this story will spread from coast to coast, beginning in America’s biggest cities.

It will be impossible to cover this crisis without paying attention to religious people and religious institutions.

Ponder this: If an oldline church near your newsroom suffers several deaths within a week or so, should the faithful gather for the funerals? And what happens to Easter?