Musings in a Time of Crisis I

Being in touch with the heart tells us the quality of our existence, tells us how we recognize the truth...The heart also is the place where we know who we really are.

~ Russ Hudson

Center for Action and Contemplation

 "The Heart Center, Enneagram Part Two," March 3, 2020

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AIDS, Ebola, SARS, MERS, Corona Virus/COVID-19. We know them all by their acronyms, no definitions, no explanations, needed.

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Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, 600 billion tons of melted ice, record temperatures in Antarctica: Our gleam of the awful.* Earth destroying parts of itself. How, after this crisis resolves, do we ensure we re-create the world once given to us as Eden? The new earth to which we're pointed by Revelation 22?

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Can you imagine a world with sufficient Corona virus testing kits; enough respirators and ventilators, N95 face masks, personal protective equipment (gloves, gowns, shoe coverings); plentiful stocks of insulin; plentiful stocks of pain-relieving drugs; an equivalent ratio of health care professionals to patients; humans smart enough to practice social distancing, not to keep from becoming infected but to prevent their nurses and doctors from becoming infected? To prevent an Italy from happening?

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What happens in the life of a child that he grows up to be a bully, a liar, a president corrupted by power bestowed by the very people he hurts?

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How do we learn to hear the refugee, the drug addict, the poor, the homeless, the sick, the forgotten, the unforgiving, each other?

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All week we've watched our futures fall with the declines in the stock market. The billionaires, exercising their options, are still billionaires.

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Even cash has become too dirty to use in our commerce. 

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Gun sales in America rise the longer the current crisis lasts.** But we also have this:

Mozambique Tree of Life, 2004

Crafted of 600,000 Weapons

3.5 M, Half-Ton

Commissioned by British Museum

Installed at British Museum 2005

And the leaves of the tree [are] for the healing of the nations. 

(Rev. 22:2, NIV)

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Consider: if you're lucky enough to have two houses, one at the beach, both hidden behinds walls and a security gate, will you have enough multiple 12-roll packages of your favorite brand of toilet tissue for every bathroom?

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If hope is a prayer, teach me the words.

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* This phrase appears in Jeremie Begbie's essay "The Future: Looking to the Future: A Hopeful Subversion" in For the Beauty of the Church: Casting a Vision for the Arts (Baker Books, 2010), edited by W. David O. Taylor. It's a relatively short collection of wonderful essays.

** See NPR, "Some Stock Up on Guns and Ammunition During Coronavirus Crisis", March 20, 2020.