Two weeks ago, on a Monday morning, I had a calendar full of meetings, travel, and church activities.
Yet, also, two weeks ago, on a Monday morning, the grass was not quite green, there were no daffodils or forsythia blooming in my yard, and the birds who came to my bird feeder came quietly—without the territorial chirps of spring.
Signs of Change
Now, this week, as Monday comes, I expect to spend the day at home, everything on my calendar has been cancelled, and….and the grass is intensely green, daffodils and forsythia bloom, and the birds blessedly make the music of emerging spring.
Signs changed. Life changed. I am adjusting, trying to make sense of it all, trying to organize my life without the signs of appointments, meetings, daily mass, and coffee with friends.
Signs in Today’s Gospel
The world changed. I must change, too. How do I use this experience to grow my soul? There is a line in today’s Gospel that draws me: “Now this was the second sign Jesus did when he came to Galilee from Judea.”
The sign today is not a great one. Jesus is not revealing himself at a well and beginning to seriously evangelize people who are not Jews. He is not working the level of miracle he worked this Sunday as he healed the man born blind.
It is a small miracle, this sign. It is done nonchalantly as Jesus walks along. Without even going to see the boy–without, really, a kind word to the child’s father–Jesus turns sickness unto death into sickness unto life. The child’s father is sent away…but met by his servants who tell him his child was healed “at the very hour” Jesus said he would be.
But, for us now, this sign is a sign of hope. Jesus turned to the boy, gave the power of healing to the boy, without even the boy’s father knowing at that moment it had happened.
Signs and Pandemic News
Our town is filled with unusual signs of sickness unto possible death: “Library closed.” “Because of the pandemic, this office will not accept cash.” “Purchase of toilet paper, paper towels, tuna, and dried beans limited to 3 items.”
The governor of Kentucky asked that all church bells ring at 10 am on Sunday morning and all citizens stop to pray.
There are also the signs in the news we look for: How many new cases of coronavirus are there today? What are the signs that someone might be coming down with it? Where can I access a mass or internet discussion group online? Calls or emails from friends ask: are you ok? What do you make of this?
Signs of God
Then there is the spring in our Northern Hemisphere. Temperatures warm. Grass turns green. Flowers bloom. Birds make more noise. These are signs of life emerging, growing, nurturing us.
There are the signs of God working in the pandemic: people checking on people; younger people offering to do errands for us olders; people praying novenas and rosaries; a sudden plethora of livestream masses and devotions online. It seems the absence of our usual means encountering God is multiplying ways for God to be close to us…and us to grow closer to God. God turns.
In multiple ways, it seems God is drawing near to us. He is coming to us—as Jesus came back to Galilee. Jesus is coming home to us. Perhaps he is healing us, quietly, as he healed the child of the royal official.
Crisis: Danger and Opportunity
We watch for signs of the danger of coronavirus close to us. It is a sign of crisis that could be a sign of sickness unto death. Yet, as I read, think, and pray, it seems within the pandemic is an opportunity, a test perhaps from God. How do we respond in the long haul?
This Lent we are giving up much: travel, sports activities, eating out, visiting, freedom to shop, get a haircut, or go to school without possibly putting ourselves and others in danger.
But the Lent of these deprivations is not likely to end at Easter. Some say it may last into the fall. Why do we stay in? To lengthen the bell curve of those infected. If we lengthen the curve, the crisis lasts longer, but far more people recover because the numbers infected in a community at one time do not exceed the capacity of the community’s health care system to provide sufficient care. Without these disciplines, infections peak at once and…and hard decisions are made about who has access to the medical care that literally turns sickness unto death into sickness unto life.
Early in the pandemic there was news that it was the medically fragile and old who are most at risk of death from coronavirus. We now know that younger, stronger people can unknowingly be carriers, though not physically sick, and they can get sick enough to die.
But, friends, our health care system is philosophically set up to give them the priority with ICU beds, respirators, and the like.
So, perhaps God is giving us a test: do we follow his plan for human life or not?
God’s Standards
This week marks the 25th Anniversary of St. Pope John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae, the Gospel of Life. In it he reminds us:
“More than anything else, it is the problem of suffering that challenges faith and puts it to the test.”
“Our life comes from God; it is his gift, his image and his imprint, a sharing of his breath of life. God therefore is the sole Lord of life: man cannot do with it what he wills. Human life and death are in the hands of God, in his power.”… “And if it is true that human life is in the hands of God, it is no less true that these are loving hands, like those of a mother who accepts, nurtures, and takes care of her child.”
“The deepest element of God’s commandment to protect human life is the requirement to show reverence and love for every person and the life of every person.”
“In the Gospel of Life old age is characterized by dignity and surrounded with reverence.”
If we, the more able, stay patient to stay home, live with social distancing and the absence of conveniences, we will save many, many lives. We will make choices that enable medical facilities to give life-giving care to all.
We as individuals and societies will make that choice. God turns his face toward us. What will we choose? Will we pass the test?
Prayer
Lord, as You turn Your face toward us in the pandemic, help us to look up and see Your face in the signs of life changing around us. Fear makes it easier for us to give up pleasures. Love helps us be self-giving. But, Lord, give us the fortitude for the long haul. Help us to turn, in our solitudes, toward You, and choose life. Help us pass the test.
