Here is the thought: the changes and adjustments which COVID-19 is forcing us to make, could turn out to be an excellent dry run for the disruptions and adaptations which climate change will force us to deal with.
My wife was relaying to me that there are sectors of American society that are objecting to being ordered by the government to stay at home. I suppose those folks will be the sources of the civil disobedience which inevitably is to come.
I attribute their attitude to stupidity. By "stupidity", I don't mean a low IQ or low educational attainment. I mean some combination of unimaginativeness, selfishness and recalcitrance. COVID-19 presumably hasn't hit most of them yet - they may not know anyone who has been infected, much less anyone who has died. It might help them to be a bit immersed in the experience coming out of Italy - to hear from the many who have lost parents, spouses, siblings, children to the disease. There is an American strain of culture which privileges family over all else; if it happens within the family, it's significant; if it happens outside the family, it's not important. I am guessing that most of these folks will eventually come around to embrace staying at home when COVID-19 becomes more personal to them.
So it could go with climate change. Once it becomes personal, people will take ownership.
Some of them are paying more attention to their favorite news sites and social media that tell them what they want to hear than to actual doctors and scientists. I think you are right that they will pay more attention when it is someone they know.
ReplyDeleteYes, they should tune into what is happening in Italy. For me the most chilling part of those accounts is what it is like to die from the virus in the over-stressed medical system. Only the sickest are hospitalized, and of those, 50% will die.There are no visitors allowed. Family will not be with you in your final moments. You will basically be alone. The sacraments of the church may not be available to you. Your body will be released from a morgue if you die, there will be no open casket viewing. Your body will probably be buried or cremated without a funeral, maybe graveside rites are possible. Of course that will be your family's problem since you will have crossed over. They will have a hard time getting any kind of closure.
I have given a lot of thought to death, and have thought from my (now) safe distance that if the virus get me I have had a good life, and I hope I am the state of grace. But I am not brave enough to die like that.
The conditions I described above were happening in Italy. But I've no reason to think it would be different here if we got overwhelmed by the virus.
Delete"Only the sickest are hospitalized, and of those, 50% will die.There are no visitors allowed. Family will not be with you in your final moments. You will basically be alone. The sacraments of the church may not be available to you."
DeleteIn an article which deserves some consideration, Joshua J. McElwee reports:
"ROME — Addressing the difficulty Catholic priests globally are having in hearing confessions of individual persons affected by the highly contagious coronavirus, the Vatican made clear March 20 that it is acceptable for bishops to offer general absolution to groups of people as deemed necessary.
"In an unexpected set of dual moves from the apostolic penitentiary, the Vatican also announced the offering of special plenary indulgences to any Catholic affected by the virus, to healthcare workers and their families, to those who pray for the end of the epidemic, and to those who die without being able to receive final rites ...
"Addressing the situation of those who are dying from the virus in isolation, without aid of the sacraments, the decree says the church is praying for such people, and "entrusting each and every one to divine Mercy by virtue of the communion of saints, grants those faithful a Plenary Indulgence at the point of death.""
https://www.ncronline.org/news/vatican/vatican-makes-clear-general-absolution-allowed-during-coronavirus-contagion
The ellipsis I included in that snippet glosses over all sorts of other conditions which I suppose one must expect from a body entitled the apostolic penitentiary and which seems to imply that these provisions could leave out a lot of folks. But the parts I've quoted here seem to suggest that the plenary indulgence is being extended to "the faithful" who are on the point of death. It's all a little confusing. But I'm choosing to interpret it in a hopeful way. And Francis could insert himself and clarify all this in a merciful direction.
I realize this is a Protestant question, but ... What is an indulgence? I understand how the indulgence racket worked in the Middle Ages, but that was all changed in the Counter Reformation.
DeleteHere the indulgences seem to a) attach special holiness to those suffering from the virus and to those caring for them, b) to encourage prayers for the end of the virus by attaching special holiness to those.doing the praying, and c) to fortify Catholics dying without the Last Rites that the Church is praying that God will be merciful despite this.
We have visited Bishop Baraga's tomb in Marquette several times. One year, indulgences were offered for that, but we were unable to go. So I guess we won't get points off our time in Purgatory or whatever accrues to the indulgence holder in the Hereafter. I don't get how this works.
Any definition I have seen of a plenary indulgence involves two things: a renouncing of attachment to sin, and an intentional spiritual act or acts. That is also true of this latest announcement. The first condition in the NCR article Jim linked is "...a spirit distanced from every kind of sin..." and then uniting oneself spiritually by means of various forms of prayer or devotion.
DeleteTo me this means sorrow for sin in a deep and personal way, and having the intention of availing oneself of, and appealing for, divine help.
I think it is good that the Church has offered this help to those who may be without the sacraments and in danger of death. However, it all boils down to an interaction between the believer and God. It has always been a teaching of the church that someone making a perfect act of contrition would be forgiven of their sins. A perfect act of contrition would be sorrow, not just out of fear of punishment, but out of love for God. Love meaning not necessarily an emotion, but a turning towards God by the will.
I think I understand what it means to gain an indulgence for oneself. But it used to be said that one could gain it for someone else. It would seem though that they would also have to have the necessary contrition, in which case they wouldn't need someone to gain it on their behalf.
My head hurts now.
DeleteKatherine - I love your answer to Jean's excellent question.
DeleteYears ago, when a friend died suddenly, I said a prayer which basically said, "God, I'd like to donate whatever indulgences I've accrued to my friend, in case he needs them." I'm sure it was a dopey prayer. But in fact it was sort of a spiritually fruitful moment - I *felt* something (the nexus between spirituality and *feeling something* being one of the signal characteristics of our age).
Indulgences strike me as a kind of spiritual currency that you deposit with the Bank.of Heaven against expenditures of sin, yours or others, with all balances being forfeit in the event of excommunication or having lapsed from communion for seven years.
DeleteIn the back of an old dialogue Mass missal Raber had, there was a list of how many years off your time in Purgatory certain prayers would earn you.
It all seems extremely legalistic and transactional, which doesn't square with how I perceive God to operate.
I suppose you could read the Prodigal Son as the story of an indulgence bonanza, with the Son's contrition earning him a big payday, while the Brother's faithfulness over time has earned him an equal number of indulgences in small, regular deposits, though his jealousy threatens to reduce his balance.
About the old missals and partial indulgences getting one years off purgatory, that is not what I was given to understand. I was told (and maybe it was mistaken) that it meant time remitted of public penance, from the days when that was the norm for serious sin. "Time" off purgatory doesn't make any sense to me, since eternity is outside of time. Maybe it's like my granddaughter getting sent to the "happy chair" by her mom. She could get up when she got a better attitude.
DeleteIt could be seen as transactional, but doesn't have to be. It could be seen as simply a prayer of petition or intercession, an interaction with a loving God who wouldn't give you a stone when you asked for bread.
I think I have to chalk indulgences up to a "Catholic thing" that makes no sense to me and therefore offers no comfort or edification. Thanks for trying, though.
DeleteJean, don't feel bad. It's one of those optional things that no one is obliged to do or believe in. My optional thing is most of the apparitions. Because most of them (there are a few exceptions) don't make sense to me? and offer me no comfort or edification. It's those Baptist and Presbyterian genes from my mother's side.
DeleteDidn't mean for the question mark to be there after "me", clumsy fingers.
DeleteBy becoming more personal, you mean when their kidd get sick and dies. The sector you are talking about is full of people who will rationalize when their elderly relatives die off: "Too bad about Gramma, but she was old and had that heart thing, and the flu would have got her if corona didn't."
ReplyDeleteCoronavirus is certainly a dry run (excellent? I don't know about that...). Rich white collar workers will move to safer climes and complain about minor inconveniences. The poor will not be able to move and will die off from diseases new and old, poor air quality, and bad water.
"The sector you are talking about is full of people who will rationalize when their elderly relatives die off: "Too bad about Gramma, but she was old and had that heart thing, and the flu would have got her if corona didn't.""
DeleteYes, that has its parallel with how people react to evidence of climate change and its effects: "I don't believe it was the Coronavirus that killed Gramma. People got sick and died before the Coronavirus, they're getting sick and dying with the Coronavirus - what's the difference? Therefore I will still get together with my friends and party."
But when their wife dies, and all of a sudden they're stuck dealing with the kids - now it gets real.
Climate change is already personal, we had that 500 year flood last year (the second time in 10 years). But people who got flooded out are blaming the Army Corps of Engineers because they didn't manage the Missouri River right. Never mind that there was just so much water there was no way it could be "managed".
ReplyDelete"There is an American strain of culture which privileges family over all else;..." Up to here, this is loosely pretty standard teaching of the Catholic Church. "...if it happens within the family, it's significant; if it happens outside the family, it's not important." At this point, call it B, you get the kinds of tribalism that are ripping nations apart all over the place. The question is, how much does the standard teaching of the Catholic Church coribute to Point B?
ReplyDeleteYes I know about the social doctrine -- the least understood and least preached and most under attack by Catholics teaching of the Church. I recently saw that Catholic Relief Services is trying to get out from under yet another charge of encouraging (gasp!) birth control by talking to people who use it. To some of our co-religionists, the world would better and birth control wouldn't happen if CRS were abolished. We have our own tribes.
Tom, you got my curiosity up. I was not aware of controversy with CRS; we have donated to it in the past. So I went looking for info, but was not able to find reliable sources. It was all Crisis Magazine, Lepanto Institute, National Catholic Register, etc. Those are not what I consider objective sources. So I gather that CRS did not condemn birth control forthrightly enough?
DeleteI saw it in The Florida Catholic, a biweekly for all dioceses (with local sections). CRS was "reviewing allegations that educational material and web pages produced by partner agencies include practices that are contrary to Catholic teaching." The "charges" come from the Lepanto Institute.
DeleteThe Institute's Web site says. "The Lepanto Institute for the Restoration of All Things in Christ is a research and education organization dedicated to the defense of the Catholic Church against assaults from without as well as from within. Whether in the form of armies, heretics, or traitors, the Church has always faced enemies seeking Her destruction. Today, the Church faces all three." When I just copied that the Intitute was accusing the Salesians of promoting "contraception, masturbation." Dang Salesians.
The Lepanto Institute is one of he Nosy Parkers who make life a living hell for officials of Catholic organizations Someone in the Vatican also gets slugged on the LI web site for supporting sustainable growth, which means (as we all know) abortion. The Catholic Campaign for Human Development is also under constant attack for working with people like Unitarians, who are not sound on abortion, and Jews, who are not sound on the divinity of Christ, to alleviate poverty. Better not to alleviate poverty if you have to do it with unsound allies.
I am not sure the busybodies who are more Catholic than the pope have thumb and forefinger opposition.
""There is an American strain of culture which privileges family over all else;..." Up to here, this is loosely pretty standard teaching of the Catholic Church. "...if it happens within the family, it's significant; if it happens outside the family, it's not important." At this point, call it B, you get the kinds of tribalism that are ripping nations apart all over the place. The question is, how much does the standard teaching of the Catholic Church contribute to Point B?"
DeleteI truly don't think it contributes. I think it's pretty well-understood that the church defends the human rights of undocumented immigrants, over and against the cultural strain which says, "Some goddam immigrant took my brother-in-law's job, so mistreat 'em all as much as you want."
Jim, But that doesn't explain where the Catholics in MAGA hats are coming from.
DeleteThirty intubated at a NJ hospital. One nurse I know is angry and frustrated with persistent nonchalance among people yet unaffected, more concerned with their stock losses than the spread of the virus. I have experienced such frustration for years regarding the indifference to climate change. Same mental dynamics and evolution involved, just spend up in the case of this virus.
ReplyDeleteSpend up = sped up
DeleteOne of the big gaps in the news in Michigan has been reportage on actual hospital conditions and context. Is 30 intubated patients a lot for this hospital in NJ you mention? I suspect so.
DeleteThe small regional medical center where my mother had her heart surgery had about 20 ICU/CCU beds that could be converted to isolation chambers. If you can cram two patients into a room, that isn't sufficient for a population center of 83,000 people, especially since there will still be people having heart attacks, strokes, and traumatic injuries who will need to be kept away from C19 patients.
I understand the nurses's frustration. People just cannot seem to wrap their heads around the magnitude of this disaster. They've seen conditions in Italian hospitals, but that's Over There, where the population is old and "Italians are always hugging and standing close in line." They think it's all different here.
Yes. Regarding traumatic injuries, it might be a good time to stay off of ladders and avoid any even slightly risky activities. I certainly won't be clearing my gutters or chain sawing during this disaster.
DeleteStanley, You don't belong on that ladder anyway. You may have twinkletoes for the dance floor, but a ladder is vertical. Isn't there a neighborhood kid who can do it for a couple of bucks?
DeleteActually,Tom, I have shields on my gutters now but they require some clearing yet. If the kid falls down, I'll have a lawsuit on my hands. I'm looking into gadgetry to deal with it, gadgetry that keeps my feet on the ground. I am one of the worst acrophobes.
DeleteIn our area there are various businesses who provide gutter cleaning services. The standard few in our area appears to be $75.
DeleteYou won't get your gutters cleaned by any Michigan businesses. Gov. Gretchen just shut down everything but essential services as of midnight tonight and ordered people to stay home except for banking, gassing up, or getting food and drugs. Once it warms up tomorrow, we're going to start looking scrub bushes around the house and doing some yard sprucing up. But no ladders or power equipment!
DeleteThis morning a friend of mine needed to send a package to her daughter in another state. We discussed the options. The post office would require her to touch too many surfaces, and there is usually a line. The UPS you just hand the package to the attendant and they do everything. The whole operation is visible from parking area. I advised her to drive there and wait until there was no one in line. Everybody else had the same idea. When she arrived everyone was sitting in their cars and entered the store when their turn came. Sometimes people do the right thing.
ReplyDeleteWe carried in dinner last night. I had never done "curb side service" before at a restaurant (by the time I got my drivers license as a teen-ager in the late 1970s, the carhop joints had all disappeared). I ordered ahead, using the restaurant's website (took way too long, but it's the new normal, I guess). The website told me my order would take 19 minutes.
DeleteI hopped in the car and drove over to the restaurant - it was nice to get out of the house and have somewhere to go. It was snowing in Chicago, so there were even fewer cars on the road than there normally would be on a Sunday evening during this stay-at-home time.
When I arrived, there was an employee standing at the parking lot entrance who was holding a hand-held technology device. I rolled down my car window, she stepped over (too close - less than 6 feet away) and asked me if I had placed an order already, and if so, what was my name. Gave her my name and she directed me to a numbered parking spot outside the door to the restaurant - as it happened, it was a handicap spot, now repurposed for curbside service (which seemed a little weird, but I guess there is no need for disabled drivers to get out of their cars now?). Eventually the food came out. I thought maybe the server would direct me to put down the passenger side window in order to keep a little social distance between us, or possibly set the bags of food down in the snow and then take a few steps back, but she had me roll down the driver's side window and handed in the bags. Way too close to me. I gave her a $5 tip - not sure what the socially-acceptable tip is for curbside delivery.
When I got home, we tried to do something which, according to one of my siblings who lives in California, is being recommended in that state: unwrap the food, take it out of the carry-out containers, put it on our own plates, throw away the carry-out containers and immediately get the trash out of our house. My family completely failed at this: there were french fry containers and wrapped sandwiches landing on plates all over the dining room table. Oh well. We'll get better with practice, I hope.
My husband did a couple of errands this morning. We were out of computer paper, so he called the office supply store and asked if they had any. They did. When he got there the sign on the door said call them on your cell phone and they will unlock the door. There were two people there, both of them were employees. Then he went to Bomgaar's to get cat food. He said there was just a handful of people there, and they sanitized the checkout counter between customers.
DeleteMy dentist has cancelled all non-emergency appointments and moved the one I had up a month.
The new normal is sucky.
The sporting goods store is right next to pet's plus where we got cat food and litter for a couple of weeks. While Raber ran in to make purchases on behalf of the cats, I counted six people coming out with guns and/or ammo. Apparently this is going on statewide. https://www.9and10news.com/2020/03/18/northern-michigan-gun-store-seeing-massive-sales-amid-coronavirus-panic/
DeleteOur post office was totally empty when I went to drop a letter in the mail... Further...the doors were open so I didn't have to touch anything....
DeletePeggy (and Irene) - the infection numbers we are reading about NYC infection rates are off the charts. I hope all of you are wrapping yourselves and your families in Saran Wrap and bathing in Purell thrice daily. Please try not to go out!
DeleteCops are rather offline at the moment. You can drive the length of rt. 80 in NJ without a radar detector going off. That might be a motivation to be armed. Help may not be on the way.
DeleteOn last Thursday I went to my ENT specialist for my regularly scheduled appointment. They checked my temperature and had me answer questions before admitting me to the waiting room.
ReplyDeleteMy podiatrist's office called me about my regularly scheduled appointment for this Friday, and asked to move it up to earlier in the day. As people cancel appointments they are basically moving people up. Today all their business will be finished by noon. Again it seemed that people are doing very reasonable things to cope with the new environment.
They are trying to mobilize volunteers to sew 10,000 medical masks for some of the Omaha hospitals. These can be laundered and re-used. I'm sure they're not as good as the disposable ones, but they're a lot better than nothing.
ReplyDeleteI heard a rumor that there was a lot of contagious disease supplies from the Obama and Clinton administrations stored in warehouses somewhere. They would be outdated, but does a mask really outdate? Was not able to find verification of the rumor.
My hometown has run out of bread and flour. So my sister-in-law drove out to the Mennonite store. They mill their own flour and have yeast and other home baking supplies. My guess is they'll have a lot of trade, even if they are out in the country over a gravel road.
We have an Amish market nearby, but I would not buy ANYthing from the Amish or Menonnites right now. Many communities are not observing recommendations and orders for social distancing. https://www.ydr.com/story/news/2020/03/18/pa-coronavirus-how-amish-community-responding/2864752001/
DeleteJim P, I just got an email supposedly from you touting "CBD Gummies" I'm going to assume someone is using your name in vain!
ReplyDeleteYeek, that's concerning. Which email address is it allegedly from? Sounds like something got hacked, or spoofed, or something?
DeleteThe email address is marievictorine@sfr.fr
DeleteKatherine, I get CBD Gummies mail four or five times a day. Never got any from people I know, but I don't always look to see who it's from. Gummies and Keto are filling the gap once filled by Roger Stone before I blocked him. They are barely less oboxious.
DeletePretty sure that's not me!
Delete