When the corona virus arrived we were instructed to stay at home and not to socialize.
Traffic stopped, the air became sweet and clear. I pulled my swing chair under the beech trees and breathed! Tender leaves frilled almost transparent through their tawny sheaths. The sky was that gorgeous blue that goes on forever and birdsong was everywhere from dawn till long after dusk. Every rustle was magnified as nesting began and young were fed. l had all the time in the world just to be with creation.
“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God … and without him was made nothing that was made “
How that struck me as youngster! And then: “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.”
So few words to say so much! The son of God was born as all humans are born and in that birthing we all share the divinity of God who is the Creator of all the Cosmos.
Anyone who has attended a birth will have experienced the silence when baby takes its first breath followed by a wonderful cry.
I thanked God for the garden and all its inhabitants, for shimmering sunsets and full moons but I became very conscious of families trapped in crowded conditions where the poorest and weakest would suffer most, of care workers exhausted, of lost jobs and mounting deaths and I prayed for mercy.
Was God showing us what our lack of care for our planet would cost if we continue to pollute, abuse and degrade it?
A virus is not of itself a creature! Virologists call it an entity because it cannot survive on its own. Incapable of reproduction it invades living cells and programs them to make more virus. That it invades our bodies by entering through our eyes, nose and mouth is an obscenity. By targeting the respiratory system it deprives us of the oxygen which keeps us alive.
I decided that this thing could not be one of God’s creatures.
I’m afraid now of losing that feeling of the Wholeness of Everything.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
Katherine O’Malley
