It's only a catch-22 if those are the only two options and the only two lens. Is the goal attendance? Or something else? I don't think attendance is the goal of church. It's transformation. It's to get people to participate in the mission of the church - Matthew 28 stuff.

In many ways what is going on is a correction of sorts. Attendance and membership grew post-WWII because the world was anxious. Pre-WWII churches were small. The decline of the membership of the church started soon after the boom and has been going on ever since. It's been increasing in recent decades and especially during the pandemic. Of course there's lots of reasons for this - too much to go into here.

I think much of this speaks to the fact that life is complicated and messy. That often there aren't nice easy answers that make everything work out nicely.

At any rate - yes, I agree that context matters. The answers are unique to each church. I don't think of the pandemic as damage. I see it as just life. How we approach it is either negative or positive. It just is what it is. Too many churches have been waiting for normal to return, missing the here and now of life. Did churches do the same thing during war, or plagues, or other catastrophes? Life goes on, and it comes in a variety of ways. How we approach it is what matters. What are we waiting for? some ideal that never really comes? A form of nostalgia? We are called to live now, regardless of the circumstances. And that Jesus will be with us in the midst of it.