Pandemic reflections

My Thoughts on Receiving the Vaccine

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This picture was taken moments after receiving the second dose of the Pfizer vaccine on March 9. We were sitting in the parking lot outside the Celeste Center at the Ohio state fairgrounds for our fifteen minute wait after receiving our shots from the efficient volunteers working with the Columbus Health Department. As I reflect on all this, I find myself filled with a profound sense of gratitude to God in so many ways:

  • For those volunteers–EMTs, nurses, and other health professionals serving on their day off.
  • For our local public health officials, who organized this vaccine site and have provided invaluable health advice throughout the pandemic.
  • For genetic sequencing technology that made it possible for scientists around the world to have the complete genome of the COVID virus, the operating instructions that make the virus work.
  • For the researchers who invested years in their academic training and long hours in vaccine research.
  • For new vaccine technologies, including the mRNA technology that helped reduce the time to initially make the vaccine and is tailored to activate my body’s immune response to the spike proteins on the virus that enable the virus to infect us. From what I hear, it is also easily tweaked, as the virus mutates.
  • For the regulatory agencies like the FDA that ensured that the vaccine is safe and effective through the standard process of testing the vaccine.
  • It is amazing that it is over 90 percent effective. Flu vaccines are typically 40-60 percent effective. The hopes with COVID was a vaccine that was 50 percent effective.
  • For both the Trump and Biden administrations who facilitated the development, production, and distribution of the vaccines (although companies did not receive payments from the government until vaccines were delivered). Despite the highly partisan nature of our politics at present, both parties and administration contributed to this amazing effort.
  • For our state’s governor who has wrestled with the hard decisions balancing lives and livelihoods throughout the pandemic, and opening vaccination to all adults a month ahead of the president’s target. We can argue ways it might have been done better or differently, but I’m thankful for not having to make those decisions and our governor’s willingness to make hard and sometimes unpopular decisions. That is good servant leadership.
  • I’m grateful that we are already seeing lower case numbers, lower hospitalizations, and lower death numbers, especially among our elderly population (and I hope we all team up to keep it that way).
  • I’m grateful for the possibility in the next week of being able to share a meal in person with vaccinated friends in safety.
  • I’m grateful that because of the vaccine that even if I should be infected, it is far less likely that I can infect others. Throughout this, my concern is less that I’ll be infected than that I could infect and be the source of serious illness in someone I love.
  • Perhaps above all, I find myself in wonder afresh that the vaccine and the research that produced it is an expression of what it means to be created in the image of God and given dominion under God for his creation. It means the capacity to create vaccines that subdue viruses. I see vaccines like the one in my arm as yet another way in which we were made to glorify God and love our neighbors.

Finally, as I mentioned, I’m glad for a chance to do something tangible to love my neighbor. I see vaccines (like masks) as not so much about protecting me as protecting others. Because of the requirements of social distancing and our age, we’ve not been able to do things with people. We’ve found other ways to care, but it is nice to do something physical and not virtual that makes a difference.

Side effects? They’ve been minimal for both of us. I had a sore arm for a day or so after–like most vaccines, and was a bit tired the night of the second shot. My wife had a bit more–tiredness for a couple days and a rash near the injection site that disappeared within three days–all within the range of normal.

As I’ve noted previously, I’m not into vaccine arguments. I studied the information and made my personal decision a long time ago. Now I’ve acted on that decision. I’m won’t argue with you about yours. But I will give thanks that I could make the decision I did.

Review: God and the Pandemic

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God and the Pandemic, N. T. Wright. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing, 2020.

Summary: Reflects both upon our quest to know “why the pandemic?” and how we should then live.

Many of us have tried to make sense of “why the pandemic?” For some, we’ve resorted to conspiracy thinking, pointing to this country and that, this political leader and that. For some believing people, the response has been to see this as a retributive plague, God paying us, or others, back for their sins. This idea of retribution has a long history, expressed most tellingly in the friends of Job who contended that Job’s losses and sufferings had to arise from some sin in Job’s life from which he needed to repent.

N. T. Wright argues quite differently in this short book, easily read in an evening. Considering Job, and other situations, notably the condition of Israel enslaved in Egypt, the appropriate response was not “repent” but “lament.” Lament is the cry of dependence that doesn’t understand the why, but looks to God for both strength to bear up and for deliverance. It is the cry of “how long?”

Wright turns to Jesus and the telling scene at Lazarus’ tomb. He doesn’t engage in theodicy. He weeps, entering into the deep grief of the world. And then, foreshadowing his own work of the cross and the empty tomb, he bids Lazarus to come forth. In his ministry, the “sovereignty” of God, the coming of the kingdom is evident in the works of healing, the restoration of what was broken. This work culminates in his own crucifixion, death, and resurrection.

In the apostolic preaching, it is not natural catastrophes, famine, and plague around which the call to repent comes. It is around the person of Jesus, the one who preached, “repent for the kingdom of God is near.” The kingdom was near because Jesus was near. Then Wright turns to Paul and Romans 8 which he considers most significant for our response as Christ-followers. Noting our love of the beginning and ending of this chapter, he invites us to consider some of the less cheery verses of Romans 8:22-27

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. (New International Version)

Wright comments on what this means in practice:

“It means that when the world is going through great convulsions, the followers of Jesus are called to be people of prayer at the place where the world is in pain. Paul puts it like this, in a three stage movement: first, the groaning of the world; second the groaning of the Church; third the groaning of the Spirit–within the Church within the world. This is the ultimate answer to those who want to say that the present Coronavirus crisis is a clear message from God which we can at once decode, either as a sign of the End, a call to repent, or simply as an opportunity for a standard kind of evangelism.”

He then turns to Romans 8:28 which he would contend may be best translated, “God works all thing towards ultimate good with and through those who love him.” Instead of speculation around sovereignty, Paul invites us to follow Jesus in the good work God would do in, with, and through us during this time. Practically then, Wright bids us to both pray where lament is prominent, and act in the manner of Jesus to care as appropriate to our station. He reminds us through a poem of Malcolm Guite written on Easter of 2020 and reflecting on the applause given health workers in the UK each Thursday that Christ is not locked down in locked down churches. A short excerpt:

On Thursday we applauded, for he came

And served us in a thousand names and faces

Mopping our sickroom floors and catching traces

Of that corona which was death to him:

Good Friday happened in a thousand places

Where Jesus held the helpless, died with them

That they might share his Easter in their need,

Now they are risen with him, risen indeed.

Malcolm Guite, Easter 2020, as cited by N.T. Wright

N.T. Wright wrote this book in spring of 2020. I’m curious what he would say today, after waves of infections, contentious debates in many countries about the measures to be taken, and the rancorous discussions on the internet. What is striking to me is his call to prayer and self-giving service is not one I’ve heard among Christians. We’ve deferred the latter to healthcare workers (many who are people of faith) who have the proper gear. There has been precious little prayer, perhaps only at the point when we learn of a sick friend. We are now in a season where the hope is that the virus will recede with the advent of vaccines and there is this unquenchable thirst to return to normal. I wonder if Wright’s book might be a good source of self-examination for us, helping us ask what kind of people we have been during the pandemic, and what kind of people will we be coming out. Will we be the contentious and the conspiratorial? Or will we be the prayerful servants of Christ, his hands and feet in the world?

New Year Reflections

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December Vectors by Vecteezy

Happy New Year!

I find myself coming into this year saddened, grateful, waiting, and hopeful.

Saddened: So many lives ended too soon by COVID-19, including at least one friend. The divided state of our nation that can’t even agree on something as simple as wearing masks, that can’t unite around a common enemy in the form of a virus. The deepening unsettling recognition of how deeply engrained racism is in our country and my own complicity. I grieve today for Andre Wells and Casey Goodson from my city who won’t see the new year. I grieve for a warming planet and the existential threat that we refuse to face. I grieve the culture of deception and the death of truth in a grave of universal suspicion. I wish all this would have ended with 2020. The trouble is that time passes, but we carry these things embedded in our lives. I’m not pleased with what I’ve seen of myself and as I move into the new year, I want to look at what God wants to change in me.

Grateful: Quite simply, I’m grateful to be alive, for each and every day. With so much closed down and so many at home, I’m grateful for all the conversations I’ve had with friends during 2020–so many I’ve not spoken with in years. Our church hasn’t met in person since March yet I’ve been touched by the mutual care we’ve practice from prayers to porch fairies with bags of groceries for shut-ins. We’ve still been able to serve a community through a garden, a food pantry, school supplies and Christmas gifts and winter clothes for children. I feel our pastor has been touched by God to speak into our hearts to help us all live through this time. Significantly, so far, none of us have been sickened. There has been time to read, to think, and to realize that we don’t need to shop and eat out to be entertained. I’m grateful for deck, patio and driveway visits with our son and his wife. We’ve enjoyed plein air painting with friends and participating in a virtual choral work. I hope I can learn the lessons of gratitude and its companion, generosity, in 2021.

Waiting: Our pastor spoke honestly and thoughtfully this past Sunday about waiting, and that waiting would continue to be part of our lives in 2021. This year, and these past weeks of Advent, have taken me more deeply into how waiting is so much a part of my faith–the coming of the Savior and his good rule. It has made me long more deeply for that coming. I do struggle with knowing those for whom waiting is difficult–businesses going under, those wrestling with depression–I don’t see easy answers as long as infections are high and we must “hunker down.” I also know of stories of many who have stood by those who wait, whether with patronage and GoFundMe campaigns, or simply by being present. This time of waiting, particularly as we look toward vaccines and the hope of a return to some kind of new normal, can also be a time of taking stock of what we have learned. I suspect there are some things we might not go back to, and some things that will be all the more precious. I want to use the time of waiting both to wait with others and to discern what God’s invitations are as we come out of this.

Hopeful. I am hopeful for the impact of the vaccine. I’ve seen vaccines eradicate other diseases. I know some of the scientists who have worked on these vaccines and believe they can make a big difference in suppressing the disease if we work together and accept the vaccine when it is our turn. But ultimately, I’m hopeful because of my faith. My hope in the resurrection leads me to hope for many mini resurrections. Creative new work arrangements, new businesses and rejuvenated ones, new educational methods, and hopefully new initiatives toward racial justice in our country and my own city. Will the lessons we learned about reducing energy use be ones that lead to permanently reducing our carbon footprints? And like many of you, I’m looking forward with hope to many of those deferred celebrations, all the sweeter because we’ve had to wait so long.

This blog is in its eighth year. I am so grateful for all of you who take time to read and comment, some of you regularly. It’s been a place of sharing so many favorite things: good books, important ideas, and great memories of Youngstown among other things. Lord willing, we’ll get to do a lot more of that this year. I will leave you with a thought I came across recently in Louise Penny’s A Rule Against Murder:

“We’re all blessed and we’re all blighted, . . . . Every day each of us does our sums. The question is, what do we count?”

I do wish all who read a Happy New Year. Stay safe and count well…you all are dear to me!

Thanksgiving in a Pandemic

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“Rejoice always,  pray without ceasing,  give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, NIV).

There is one imperative that hasn’t been hard to follow during the COVID pandemic. I’m constantly hearing of people to pray for who have tested positive, are sick, and maybe very sick. Equally, I hear of many who are struggling with isolation and depression from months of physical distancing from others, and the sheer length of this virus.

Rejoicing and thanksgiving? That is harder, and were it not for some prayer practices that my work team follow in the collegiate ministry with which I work, I probably would not do much of this. Thank you, Carrie and Kathy, for this. But it is hard. Monday night I learned of a long-time acquaintance who worked in Student Life at Ohio State who passed from COVID. His smile will no longer light up any room he is in, nor will students know the care of this big bear of a man. As I write, Ohio topped 10,000 new cases in a day and set a single day record for COVID deaths.

How can one give thanks amid all this? I certainly cannot give thanks for it. That would be cruel and heartless and perverse.

Paul’s urging is to give thanks in all circumstances, not for them. He writes to a church that has faced intense persecution in an empire where Christians were not a legal, recognized religion. And life for many in these times was often nasty, brutish, and short.

Paul’s urging to give thanks is situated in the middle of passages that speak of Christian faith and hope, between the faith that assures one of God’s saving work in this life and the one to come, and the certain hope of that coming.

This leads me first to be thankful both for the life in which I enjoy God’s love and approval and that I’ve nothing to fear in death. Because I treasure the life in which I can live out that faith, I heed the measures that offer protection from getting sick. I don’t practice these out of fear but thankfulness for public health officials who offer this advice. If, despite this, I get sick, I am at peace.

I give thanks each morning when I awaken healthy, and at the end of the day.

I give thanks for all the public officials and health care workers who care for those who are sick, sometimes despite public resistance, and often putting their health on the line.

I give thanks for first responders, grocery and other frontline workers who are at greater risk, who serve us, many at relatively low wages.

I give thanks for my wife, and that I do not live alone during this time. Her daily companionship and the ways we help each other when we get too obsessed with the news, helps us both to keep a sense of proportion

I give thanks for the small blessings of daily life, meals prepared and shared with each other, working together on home projects, de-cluttering, and maintenance. Not going out so much gave us the time to work together on those tasks we avoided–like the first cleanout of our garage in ten years or more.

I give thanks for my son and his wife. I admire their good sense throughout the pandemic without any expressions of parental concern. We won’t be together for Thanksgiving or Christmas (apart from a drive-by outdoor gift exchange). We’re grateful for outdoor, physically distanced visits from time to time and that they have also remained healthy.

I give thanks for our church. We have not met in person since early March but I feel, if anything, closer as I pay attention to the prayer lists and stay in touch with a number of individuals. And it might be that I pay even closer attention to our pastor’s sermons when he is staring me in the face on Zoom!

I give thanks for the glorious sunsets I’ve seen on walks during these months. I’ve thought of some time posting a photo spread of the sunsets of the pandemic.

I give thanks for the glorious music I’ve listened to (and the chance to be a part of one virtual recording) even while I miss our local choral group. We all have recognized more clearly than ever the treasure of singing together.

I give thanks for the opportunities to join our plein air group in safe, outdoor painting outings this summer and online gatherings with artist friends.

I give thanks for books (of course!). I’ve kept company with writers like Hilary Mantel and Marilynne Robinson. I’m thankful for publishers who usually say “yes” to review requests. As always, I’m thankful for the incomparable Byron and Beth Borger at Hearts and Minds Books. I’m so thankful for all my book-loving friends who help turn reading into a community conversation.

I give thanks for meaningful work encouraging emerging scholars as they connect faith and their academic calling. I get to write, edit, and interview people far more intelligent and gifted than I. This old dog keeps learning about various social media platforms, web analytics, marketing. Everyday brings conversations with a variety of partners inside and outside our organization. Fortunately, I am able to do all of this at home.

The pandemic has taught me in new ways to focus on all the things we have and may do, even in a time of loss. Perhaps confronting so much that I cannot control has challenged me to greater prayerfulness throughout the day.

By God’s grace, next year’s list may include so much we’ve had to leave aside. There is so much I look forward to be “over with.” But I don’t want to forget either those we’ve lost or the particular goodness of God in these times. Most of all. I am thankful and rejoice in the unchanging and certain hope our faith affords us. As we sit down to dinner today the abundance on our table will reflect the abundance in our hearts and lives.

Pandemic Fatigue

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What day is it? They all seem alike. I haven’t been out to eat at a restaurant since early March. I haven’t hugged my son and daughter-in-law since early in the year. All my conversations, except with my wife, are on Zoom, except for brief exchanges when I’m out for walks in my neighborhood. I miss singing with my choir–except for virtual recordings (I did last night). I hadn’t reckoned on this going for seven months, and perhaps that many more.

I don’t think most of us did, and it is hard on all of us.

And it is very tempting to just say, “I’m over with this.” Can’t I just throw a big football party with all my friends? Or celebrate Thanksgiving with lots of friends and food?

And then I remember I’ve made it through seven months. We are in our sixties, and that is good news. By God’s grace, we haven’t gotten sick when others in our age group have gotten very sick. We personally know of people who have died–our age or younger. Perhaps you do as well.

I’m also reminded of life challenges that have lasted into years. And there were times when I wanted to throw in the towel. Caring for a parent with terminal colon cancer. Walking through each parent’s final years, the calls in the night (never good), the emergency trips home. There was a graduate degree while working a full time job with a young family. There were the half marathons I ran. Walking with my wife through close to a year of cancer treatments and recovery. Working a number of years to accomplish work goals that couldn’t be done in a year.

I’ll bet you have stories like that. You were tired. You even were tempted to quit. Why didn’t you? Those memories and the answer to why you didn’t quit might be important in your life right now. It might be your love for someone else who was dear to you. It might be a goal that answers to a deep calling in your life. It might be a faith that believes goodness and truth triumph in the end.

What practices sustained you when you had to say “no” to many good things in life? Maybe it was a few quiet minutes with some music and a glass of wine. Maybe it was a walk in the park. Maybe you read the Bible or said your prayers. Reaching out to a trusted friend with whom you can be your unfiltered self. And you kept doing these things as you were able.

While none of us have gone through a pandemic before, many of us know what it is to go through hard things that aren’t over in a few days or weeks. We know what it is to be fatigued, and find the resources to keep going.

And if we haven’t? Then this is our time to develop the grit, the resolve, the stick-to-it-iveness that will serve us well in any other challenges we face in our lives. What story will you tell about this time?

Why does it matter? Because the infectiousness of this disease means the action of one could affect 10 or 50 or 100 others. In a highly individualistic country, it reminds us how our lives are inextricably intertwined. That party could result in the deaths of grandparents who weren’t even present.

Have you ever thought, “I’ve made it this far, I don’t want to lose all I’ve worked for when I’m getting closer to making it through.” We’re a lot closer to a vaccine than last March. We’re closer to when this virus will recede if not disappear.

As a Christian, I do not fear death. But my faith also teaches me that life is never to be thrown away heedlessly. These have been good months of reading and writing, communicating and planning, building and clearing out. They have been months of clarifying and simplifying. They have been months of trying new things. I’ve been fortunate to work, and work as hard in many ways as any time in life. They are months for which I’m glad I’ve been alive. By God’s grace I hope to be doing these things for a while yet and I want to be around when we can gather and party and sing again–without masks.

I want that for you as well. Let’s hang in there together.

How Now Shall I Live?

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Sunset over Western Hills. Bob Trube, 2020

I’ve gone through a range of feelings as the pandemic has moved into a new spike in infections in Ohio and elsewhere. From conversations with friends, it seems like all of us are going through similar fluctuations. I share about my own journey not to say how others should respond, because your situation is not mine.

I find myself really frustrated with reports of coronavirus parties and others engaging in high risk activities voluntarily and then getting sick. You know the feeling when a couple kids who were acting up and keeping the rest of the class from going out for recess?

I struggle with feelings of futility. I’m enough of a data geek to see that our state’s infection trends are following those of states like Florida, Texas, Arizona, and California. I’ve tried to warn others. Our governor has said the same thing. It feels to me that all this falls on deaf ears.

I grieve for many businesses who have tried to do the right things but with rising infections are going to take a hit whether or not there are stay-at-home orders.

I sense the desperation in all the social media posts that tout treatments and cures and vaccine progress. We are desperate for things to go back to the way they were.

I’m saddened by what seems to me magical thinking that for months has been saying this will go away. It will go away when it does. Likewise for those who are saying it really isn’t so bad, or they don’t need a vaccine. It seems to me a “choose your own reality” effort, and I hope this doesn’t result in a serious infection or super-spreading event.

I’m dismayed by all the self-appointed experts who think they know more than people who have dedicated their lives to studying epidemiology and public health to prepare for pandemics like the one we are facing. I watched our own state health director driven to resign her office after vicious, racist statements, attacks on her character, and threats on her and her family’s lives. I was especially angered because she came from my home town, overcoming an incredibly rough childhood.

I marvel at the inconsistency of many companies preferring to have their staff work at home while we seem determined to send children to school. At the same time, I am saddened by spouses (often women) resigning jobs to oversee at-home education. I realize there are no easy answers for all this, which frustrates me as well.

I could go on, but you get the idea…probably because you’ve been there, or are there.

All this was swirling around in my mind recently when I went for an evening walk. I’ve done this often to clear my head after a day’s work, and the news of the day. My thoughts turned to Matthew 6: 25-27:

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

It reminded me that my fretting about all these things, real though it was, was needless. I was fretting about things largely out of my control. I needed to acknowledge it, and let it go. My worrying was very unlikely to change anything. It wouldn’t add to my life. It wouldn’t change others. God alone can do that.

It reminded me to live in the moment of God’s care. I was breathing, walking, taking in a gorgeous sunset. We’ve made it through four months of basically shelter at home. I’m blessed to share it with my wife of 42 years. We’ve enjoyed socially distanced visits with family and friends outdoors. We’ve gone out painting together. I have meaningful work I can do at home. I’ve enjoyed so many good books, and written about them. We’ve done drive-by birthday celebrations and stayed connected with church, choral, and artist friends on Zoom. There is so much good for which I’m grateful, and life is better when I remember this and live there.

I don’t know how many more months of this we have to go through. I am realizing this one is out of my control. I’m probably better for realizing that what others do, intelligent or irrational, is also out of my control. Perhaps the only thing I can do is extend a kind word and listening ear when this whole thing is getting someone else down, and to enjoy with others what is still good in this life, in this day. Given that we are in an “at risk” population by age, we will continue to choose low risk activities, social distance and wear masks, while continuing to learn to be creative with those. It’s really OK. Each day has its riches–a conversation, times when a painting actually works, a passage in a book, flowers in the garden, a sunset, a cloud formation, or even working up a sweat pruning trees and weeding flower beds. Perhaps I still have much to learn from the birds.