A Response to, "For Christians, Dying From COVID (Or Anything Else) Is A Good Thing"

 I recently read an article at The Federalist called, "For Christians, Dying From COVID (Or Anything Else) Is A Good Thing."  I found myself…unsettled as I read. It’s not that I am bothered by the difference of opinion I have with the author about what churches should do or how cautiously Christians should respond to COVID. I think there is room for good faith disagreements as people genuinely wrestle with what to do. 

I’m bothered by the manner in which the argument is made, especially because it misuses Scripture in the process of making the argument. This is a long post, but there is much to be said.

 

I do not offer the following response to impugn the character of the writer, but to sort through the validity and soundness of the logical and scriptural arguments being made. 

The quotes from the article are in italics; my response follows each quote.

Where Do We Go From Here? (Planting The Wind; Harvesting The Whirlwind, Part 4)

This is the fourth post in a series on the history of slavery and racism in the United States.

In Part One, "1619 To The Civil War: Slavery Before Emancipation," I noted the biblical basis for caring about the history and the legacy of racism in our country before giving an overview beginning in 1609 through the Civil War and Emancipation. Basically, we should care because Jesus cares. If you have not yet read the first post, I encourage you to do so. There is a lot of information that will add context to what you are reading.

"Emancipation To The Great Migration: Jim Crow, Reconstruction and Sundown Towns" continued to look at the sinful impact and harsh legacy from the mid-1800s to the early 1900s. So what can we do as Christians in response to racism and discrimination? I see a response happening in three different ways:  how we respond personally, how we respond in our churches, and how we respond in political policy and governance. 

In From The Red Summer To Today: The Lived Experiences Of This Generation, I ended by quoting Esau McCauley:

Jesus asks us to see the brokenness in society and to articulate an alternative vision for how we might live. This does not mean that we believe that we can establish the kingdom on earth before his second coming. It does mean that we see society for what it is: less than the kingdom. We let the world know that we see the cracks in the facade. Hungering for justice is a hungering for the kingdom. Therefore the work of justice, when understood as direct testimony to God’s kingdom, is evangelistic from start to finish. It is part (not the whole) of God’s work of reconciling all things to himself.  

This is the focus of this post.  

How we respond personally

 

Christians are called to the most basic and most daunting of commands: to love others as Christ has loved us.[1] It really does boil down to this. The book of 1 John is clear that if we don't love others, we don't love God.[2] Paul makes clear in his writing that there is no room for artificial divisions or hierarchies in the church.[3]  To his first century, predominantly Jewish audience, the divisions were male/female, Gentile/Jew, and slave/free.  These kinds of barriers fall once we do life together with Christ as our Lord as God intended. 

 

There is no room whatsoever for judgment or the assigning of worth and value based on irrelevant distinctions. It doesn't mean that we ignore that these differences exist -  I mean, men and women are different -  but it does mean that those differences do not order the attribution of value, worth, or dignity.  So it is with us today in the discussion of shades of melanin. If Paul were writing today, I suspect he would add black/white.

From The Red Summer To Today: The Lived Experiences Of This Generation (Planting The Wind; Harvesting The Whirlwind, Part 3)

This is the third in a series on the history of slavery and racism in the United States

In Part One, "1619 To The Civil War: Slavery Before Emancipation," I noted the biblical basis for caring about the history and the legacy of racism in our country before giving an overview beginning in 1609 through the Civil War and Emancipation. Basically, we should care because Jesus cares. If you have not yet read the first post, I encourage you to do so. There is a lot of information that will add context to what you are reading. 

"Emancipation To The Great Migration: Jim Crow, Reconstruction and Sundown Towns" continued to look at the sinful impact and harsh legacy from the mid-1800s to the early 1900s. 

We pick up our narrative in 1921. Starting now, there are still people alive today who experienced these things. 

Emancipation To the Great Migration: Jim Crow, Reconstruction And Sundown Towns (Planting The Wind; Harvesting the Whirlwind, Part 2)

 This is the second in a series on the history of slavery and racism in the United States.

• From 1619 To Emancipation
• Emancipation To the Great Migration: Jim Crow, Reconstruction And Sundown Towns
• From The Red Summer To Today: The Lived Experience Of This Generation 
• Where Do We Go From Here?

In From 16019 To Emancipation, I started by noting the biblical basis for caring about the history and the legacy of racism in our country before giving an overview beginning in 1609 through the Civil War and Emancipation. Basically, we should care because Jesus cares. If you have not yet read the first post, I encourage you to do so. There is a lot of information that will add context to what you are reading. 

We pick up our narrative right after the Emancipation Proclamation.

From 1619 To Emancipation (Planting The Wind; Harvesting The Whirlwind, Part 1)

We learn some important things about how we, the followers of Jesus, ought to be present in the world simply by looking at how Jesus was present with the people in his time.

·    He “saw” people^[1] (It’s a loaded word - see Matthew 9:36 – but it led to compassionate action.)

·     He listened and thoughtfully responded (See the Rich Young Ruler^[2]; the woman who touched his garment^[3]; the woman caught in adultery.)^[4]

·     He spent time with them (He was that crazy ‘friend of sinners,'^[5] an insult Jesus embraced.) 

·     He invited himself into their homes. (Zaccheus)^[6]

·     He went to their unclean neighborhoods. (Samaria)^[7]

·     He empathized with them (Hebrew 4:15). ^[8] “In our pain; Jesus is pained. In our suffering, he feels the suffering as his own even though it isn’t… his heart is feelingly drawn into our distress.. His human nature engages our troubles comprehensively.”[9]

·     He poured out his life for them. (#crucifixion)

·     He offered them hope. “I have come that you might have life.” (John 10:10)

This is what the love of God looked like expressed through Jesus. We model the loving example of Jesus when we see, listen, spend time together with others, seek to sympathize and empathize, and pour out our lives so that we might faithfully and lovingly re-present Jesus in hope-filled attitudes, actions, and words.  

Because I want to write about an aspect of life that ought to inspire a motivating sorrow as we see the impact of evil in the world, it’s worth noting that a key way in which is described: “a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief.”[10] 

“Twice in the Gospels we are told that Jesus broke down and wept. And in neither case is it sorrow for himself or his own pains. In both cases it is sorrow over another – and in one case, Jerusalem (Luke 19:41), and in the other, his deceased friend, Lazarus (John 11:35). What was his deepest anguish?  The anguish of others. What drew his heart out to the point of tears? The tears of others.”[11]

There is a movement of people leaving white evangelicalism (#leaveloud) because of ongoing frustrations with how the brutal legacy and ongoing painful reality of racism is (or isn’t) being addressed. A recent Barna survey revealed that “more than any segment of the population, white evangelical Christians demonstrate a blindness to the struggle of their African American brothers and sisters.”[12] It doesn’t feel to many non-white evangelicals like the church is a place where the heart of Jesus for those hurt by sin is on display. Their experience is that the church is refusing to see, listen and take seriously the ongoing legacy of the pain of racism. That feels a lot like a refusal to love by a refusal to empathize.[13]

Thinking From Behind A COVID-19 "Veil Of Ignorance"

(a thought experiment inspired by John Rawls)

 

John Rawls (1921-2002) argued that we could determine just ethical principles by seeing what a free and rational people would choose if they attempted to create a just society from behind a ‘veil of ignorance’. 

 

John Rawls proposed a famous thought-experiment in which a group of humans come together and have to devise a set of principles for their society to work by. The imaginary part of this is that the individuals doing the deciding are told that there will be some people of greater and lesser intelligence, greater and lesser degrees of health, greater and lesser pigment in their skin, ability to lead, to follow, to carve wood, to care for babies, etc etc – in other words, these people would represent a reasonable cross-section of the types found in human society. However, the deciding individuals did not know which attributes they themselves possessed...

This ‘veil of ignorance’ Rawls thought would ensure a just distribution of rights and duties in his hypothetical society – just as if you were in charge of cutting up a pizza to share and only knowing that you would get the last piece: you would do your best to cut it equally. (“Deontological Ethics.” http://www.sevenoaksphilosophy.org/ethics/deontology.html)

 

Rawls thought that people would likely agree to things that would benefit the population no matter their situation: freedom of speech; a limited role for a government influenced by or answerable to the people; an equitable social system wherein people have equal opportunity, access to resources; a system that encourages virtue, etc. 

 

This veil of ignorance would make people aware that that they could be among the disadvantaged or marginalized, and they would want to make laws that would protect them if they were one of the weaker members of society and not punish them if they were one of the stronger.  

 

With that foundation in mind, let’s apply that idea to COVID-19.

MemeTalk: Are We Being Conditioned To View Freedom As Selfish?

I've been seeing commentary on freedom during COVID-19 pop up on social media, and why not? Who doesn't love freedom? And who doesn't want to avoid being conditioned by "they"? It got me thinking about how we Christians wrestle with notion of freedom in general, especially our exercise of the freedoms guaranteed to us as citizens of the United States. 

My thoughts are almost certainly incomplete and perhaps misguided, but I really think we need to wrestle more deeply with the broader theme that this meme addresses.

Living In Fear Or Faith? COVID-19 Edition

Person A wears a mask all the time, social distances, and sanitizes because they do not want to get the coronavirus. 

Person B takes Vitamin D, some herbs, essential oils, and works on building their immune system naturally because they do not want to get the coronavirus. 

 

1. A is living in fear.

2. B is living in fear.

3. A and B are both living in fear.

4. Neither A nor B are living in fear.

 

If #1 or #2, what distinguishes the two?

If #4, what word would you use to describe them: “They are living in _______”