Pandemic Anniversary: Why Did American Leadership Wait So along?

 March 11, 2020 was the official shutdown day, but it should have been much earlier

By this day last year, I had been following alarming citizen Twitter accounts in Wuhan since early in January 2020. They graphically revealed devastation. My anxiety was off the charts. By March, these Twitter accounts were methodically being shut down.

There is not a single Twitter account remaining of nearly 100 from Wuhan that I started to follow in January 2020 to track the craziness of the disease and ground-level responses to it. Most were gone by the end of March 2020.

Why did America wait so long to respond? The handwriting was on the wall—in science and all over social media.

America could have—and should have—shut down long before March 11, 2020, in order to prevent loss of life and contain the disease. The intel was there. The science was there. The devastation in China was on social media. Our national leadership was either asleep at the wheel or in full denial mode.

Did America’s vast taxpayer-funded international intelligence resources—CIA, NSA, etc.—fail to alert the Trump regime of the dramatic growth and devastation of COVID19? Or, did Trump ignore or suppress it? 

Over 515,000 citizen deaths later, Americans deserve to know fully exactly what happened.

Lent, Day 19: The Difficult Middle

The halfway point in Lent may be the most difficult part of the fast/journey

If you are observing Lent with a fast and acts of spiritual focusing, you’ve arrived at the eve of the halfway point. Tomorrow will mark twenty fast days (not counting the three Sunday feast days).

How’s it going for you?

If you are simply interested in the practice of Lent and casually checking in, for whatever reason, welcome!

This is the point of wide divergence in extended communal fasting. This is the difficult middle. It’s when fasting can seem foolish and trite and, thus, dispensable. Or, it’s when fasting can trigger a “dig in and do this thing—no matter what” motivation. There are devotees of organized Christian religion who would never think of dismissing or discounting their Lenten fast. And there are people of equal spiritual integrity and inquisitiveness who legitimately second-guess or drop the scheme midstream.

To fast from anything for forty days requires significant discipline from anyone. But for some of us, simply focusing on any one thing for forty days is unusual and unprecedented within the calendar of our lives. It may have little to do with spirituality. It may have more to do with one’s emotional and physiological setup and inclinations. Folks with some level of Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) may actually forget their intended daily Lenten trajectory in lieu of more immediate challenges and turns of events.

I frequently find myself in this boat. I have disciplined myself to think longitudinally. I have completed many courses of study, hold two graduate degrees, have seen multiple-year projects through, and invested in and helped nurture four children into responsible, independent, and thriving adulthood. I can do long term! But my default, natural proclivity is to give myself to whatever is momentary, crisic, and experiential.

That physiological reality, for me, makes every Lenten fast a plausible challenge. It’s not about love for God and neighbors or devotion to the best of the faith I’ve been taught and have taught others. It’s about steady focus on an ancient practice that frequently seems trivial and pales in comparison to pressing challenges of a world and community in crisis.

In Lent, I am called upon—we are called upon—to maintain focus, to fend off temptations to throw in the towel, to keep the fast to the end, and anticipate what may be learned, known, and experienced in no other way. 

We’re in the difficult middle. Hang in there!

Lent, Day 12: Lent Pales in Comparison to Ramadan

 If you think Lent is easy, try Ramadan

In Lent, Christians give up one habit or indulgence or necessity for 40 days. Admirable fast. Tough enough. But, come on, is it that hard?

In Ramadan, Muslims give up, from sunrise to sunset every day for a month, every intake of food or liquid.

Try it.

I have. Just to know the experience. Just to empathize with my Muslim friends and neighbors. I purchased the iPhone app. I followed the simple guidance. I woke up earlier to eat before sunrise. I held off eating or drinking until sundown.

I have not yet made it more than 10 days.

It is hard. Without a household or community who is supporting you in the journey, it is beyond difficult.

If you bypassed Lent (meh!), try Ramadan fasting that begins in April.

I will begin Ramadan fast again this year. I hope to complete it.

Completing either Lent or Ramadan or whatever intentional act of self-denial for the sake of spiritual renewal is the potentially transformative thing, it seems to me.

Lent, Day 11: Fasting Does Not Mean Passivity

Fasting is not passive, regressive, restive, or retreating.

Don’t be misled by a false notion that fasting in Lent means retreat from the troubles of the world. Or that it means resting a bit while whirlwinds of conflict—ideological or otherwise—swirl around us. Do not imagine fasting as a quaint, antiquated practice worthy of dabbling in for a bit of spiritual exploration. Do not make the mistake of fasting as a passive engagement in the face of the powers that be.

Tremendous forces are at work in our world. Principalities and powers can—and do—readily overwhelm those along for entertainment or a bit of enlightenment or daring to use them for their own ends. Half-hearted joy rides in Lent may draw one into raw power struggles in the depths.

When we dare to “deny oneself” we may be drawing a line in the sand of a heretofore silent and satiated ego that, offended, may well rise up and throw everything in the book at us to get us to return to “normal.”

If Jesus’ own temptations in his forty days of wilderness fasting are any indication, buckle your seatbelt and hang on. Whatever happens, keep your fast—no matter how trivial it may seem. Something bigger is happening that makes a simple self-denial hard to maintain.

For encouragement in this aspect of your Lenten journey, you might read The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. It seems to map the terrain of ego and temptation well.

Fasting, instead of disengaging us from real personal, interpersonal, and social/political/systemic struggles, may drive us more deeply into the heart of them. Perhaps there, in the depths and without a clear path through or out, we may experience something that will help us be part of liberation, equitable community, and change on the other side of the fast.

For now, however, stay lashed to the mast and endure the wild ride.

Second Sunday in Lent

 Try to connect wilderness fasting with Sunday feasting

If you’re trying to observe—or at least pay attention to—Lent, you know that we are a fourth of the way through the forty-day fast. Ten fast days down since Ash Wednesday, thirty to go before Easter Sunday.

As a fast participant or observer, you know by now that the six Sundays between Ash Wednesday and Easter are not counted as fast days. There are actually forty-seven days from Ash Wednesday to Easter. But every Sunday is a feast day: a perpetual celebration of the resurrection of Jesus and ever a signal of the new person, new life, and changed future all who look to Jesus are invited to live.

Even though Sundays within Lent are feast days, most Lenten observers do not interrupt their chosen forty-day fast. Those who choose to deny themselves sweets for forty days of wilderness-like fasting typically do not use a Lenten Sunday to take a break from fasting and stuff themselves with cake and candy.

Instead of ceasing to fast, Sundays in Lent are opportunities to recollect, reframe and retell the story that connects wilderness fasting with Resurrection day feasting. In the Gospels, what does self-denial suffering have to do with breakthrough and transformation? How did Jesus’ fasting and temptations connect to the first day of the week after he was crucified? How did his generous time invested outside Jerusalem impact his ultimate sojourn inside the city?

What is experienced in wilderness fasting informs and frames every other part of the journey, including the privilege of feasting.

Please note: it is not necessary to suffer in fasting in order to feast. One does not earn the feast with one’s fasting. The feast—Grace—is free, no matter where we’ve been or what we’ve come through. But, most find that following Jesus in the wilderness experiences certainly conditions and may deepen one’s recognition and gratitude for Grace.

COVID-19 and Polio Vaccinations: A Generation Between

 Deadly, debilitating pandemics and mass vaccinations are not new to my age group

I got jabbed today. My first Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine shot was at a Meijer in-store pharmacy. I signed up for their waiting list and was contacted less than 24 hours before I was able to roll up my sleeve.

There was one weird and wonderful thing about the experience: 

I stood in line with people just in my own 60-64 age group—peers born near the end of the Baby Boom generation (1946-1964) who were too young to participate firsthand in the upheavals of the 1960s. I thought about that while we waited to be vaccinated by professionals too young to know our story.

We’re older, but not old enough to have marched or protested or been drafted for Vietnam. I turned nine years old in 1968. By the time I turned 18, there was not even a draft to register for (or resist) and protests were a thing of the past—or so we thought at the time. In 1977, The Beatles were long gone, Springsteen was becoming the new Boss, The Ramones and Earth, Wind & Fire were emergent, and Stevie Wonder, Elton John, Queen, The Eagles, Linda Ronstadt, and Bob Seeger seemed to dominate pop music.

Having lived our childhoods through the Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam, and Watergate, our age group inherently distrusts authority, isn’t surprised at the worst, and yet still believes the best is possible.

There we stood together, the early sixties group, waiting to roll up our sleeves again. Deadly, debilitating pandemics and mass vaccinations are not new to us. We did this as small children for the polio vaccine. We’re doing it again with great hope for all.

Lent, Day 5: What Kind of Fast?

I’m thinking about the kinds of fasting we may choose during Lent.

The forty days of fasting in Lent mimics Jesus’ forty days of fasting in the wilderness after his baptism. The Gospels indicate that (1) Jesus was drawn into and led in the wilderness by the Spirit, where he was (2) tempted by the devil. I’ll try to unpack those two juxtaposed conceptions in an upcoming post.

So, for forty fast days (and we typically throw the six Sunday feast days in there) many of us who claim to/try to follow Jesus in an earnest way choose to fast from something we ordinarily do or consume or use.

Usually the chosen fast is something small and relatively manageable. Like chocolate (see the movie ‘Chocolat’ and you’ll discover it’s not as easy as it seems!). Sometimes it’s something more difficult. Like alcohol or smoking or fatty foods we like or social media. Pick your poison.

If you haven’t ever tried denying yourself something somewhat significant for forty days, I recommend it. See how it goes.

Who amongst us can honestly keep an even mildly chosen prohibition or fast for forty days?

Some may. Some do.

I have kept to self-selected prohibitions through Lent several times. And at the end, it has frequently felt more like a triumph of self improvement than a grace-assisted journey. I have attributed focused self-discipline to righteousness and made my Lenten victory over small vices a point of self congratulations. “I” made it!

It likely had little or nothing to do with faith. A good exercise, for sure. Good health benefits. But faith expanding? Heart purifying? Love increasing? Not likely.

Given the shallowness of those experiences, I think: if I am going to do Lent, I might as well choose to fast more deeply. Dare I fast from what it is not only difficult to fast, but what will be impossible without existential suffering and reaching out in unexplored territory of faith to finish?

I’m contemplating this today. 

Maybe I should just stick to chocolate.