I read, today, of a university student taking in a homeless person, to stay the night, due to the individual not being able to find admittance in our cities homeless shelters.  This wonderful person noted that the shelter seeker… was her ‘neighbor,’ according to the scriptures.   

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Jonathon told me of an article where a minister attested that God was good in that the coronavirus was only killing 1% of those that contracted it.  I wonder what the minister would say if his loved ones were members of the 1%?  By the way…why does God get the blame?

There is a popular school of thought, in certain religious circles, that some suffer due to their wayward and sinful ways.  Inherent in this doctrine is the caveat that if you follow the teachings of the church or sects, leader, you will flourish…while others are the chaff of the wheat from the threshing floor…or the dross from the refinement of silver.  The exclusionary doctrine is tepid and cold comfort to the adherents of the ‘us against them’ philosophy.  

There has never been a time, in the majority of our lives, like this time.  The unseen enemy that we are fighting is no respecter of persons or rank or religious affiliation.  From the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and the heir to the British Monarchy…to United States Senators and members of Congress…to our beloved American actor, Tom Hanks, we are all in this together.  

Our first responders…are not boasting of their accomplishments…they are to exhausted…and afraid.  Nurses who have no choice but to wear the same face mask, all day, and wash it out and bleach it…in order to have a semblance of protection…while they work to save our lives…are demonstrating profound love!  

I spent my career in housekeeping services at Southern Illinois University@ Carbondale.  I know of the courage and love that our custodial staffs across the world are demonstrating as they disinfect and protect us from the coronavirus!  

As Jonathon and I were standing in line at our local supermarket, yesterday afternoon, I noticed that management had installed a plastic shield that partially protected the cashiers from human contact with the customers as they rang up their sale totals.  However, the shield offered no protection when it was time to pay for the purchases and receive your change and receipt.  

Our state governors are, often, the leaders in the United States effort to combat the pandemic.  To discuss political persuasions and to categorize their extreme and herculean efforts according to political likes and dislikes…is obscene.  

Grandma Askew, spoke to me when I was a child, and talked of coming plagues and pestilences and drought and famine.  As I read the Bible I noted that the theme of all of the scripture writers…was love.  We engage in social distancing…from love for the members of our human family.  

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‘If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.  If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.  Love is patient, love is kind.  It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.’    I Corinthians 13: 1-7    NIV