Starting a website and blog in Covid-19 sheltering-at-home time feels like the wobbling placement of a Jenga piece on a tall tower. Everybody is already so overwhelmed with words. Coming at us from everywhere! It is all too much. A friend said to me this week that we needed to “curate the information streaming in.” That’s it! Pick the best and set the limits.
May my blog be a place for processing and perspective and not topple the mass and mess of messages we are getting!
It was a very strange thing to launch my book, Restoring the Paths: Sexuality for Christian Leaders right before life as we know started to shut down. I was so excited by the response of people, so blessed by their support—and then, silence. Silence because both Amazon and Barnes and Noble were understandably slowed down. Silence because my book was no longer crucial. I couldn’t keep up the book momentum, either, and found myself silenced.
It’s been a strange thing to watch the way people have turned to social media—or not. Such a place to vent invective and scorn! Perhaps to channel fears and frustrations of life today onto others. I’ve been grieved to see Christians treating others with contempt by shaming them. One of the kindest physicians that I know was called a terrorist because she expressed concern for those that die due to quarantine because they don’t have the money to get their medications or follow their medical regime, or because they are too frightened to go for help to a health facility.
Another friend lost her mother to Covid-19 and had to take leave of Facebook because of the cruel accusations she was hearing towards victims and the outrage and deepened grief she felt.
I wonder, too, about a kind of mob-of-rebellion mentality. That we don’t need social distancing or handwashing or masks or whatever because it is not really serious. A kind of social denial—I’m not old or African American or carrying these comorbidities. I read and see these things and then listen to ER and ICU nurses cry in despair over the excruciating pain of being family for those dying alone.
I’ve been thinking a lot of Old Testament responses to plague and pestilence. Repent! Lament! Turn from idols! Return to God! These are still good guidelines for us today as we carefully construct our Jenga tower.