Shut ins, All will be well, Star Trek, Austerity and Billionaires busted ........
I lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts for six months in 1985.
Whilst there I was hired by a Church in Somerville to take Holy Communion to 'the shut ins' I was paid fifty dollars a trip, provided with a car and driver and picked up from and taken back home to my apartment.
I wasn't too sure about the designation 'shut in' as most of the communicants were elderly people, unable to attend Church, but still valued as members of the church community, I wondered about a better choice of name.
But I guess we're all 'shut ins' now?
Self isolation is the preferred designation. Most of our isolation is voluntary and we remain indoors for a variety of reasons.
Self preservation is probably at the top of most peoples list.
But staying home, remaining shut in, self isolating can be seen as an 'act of love' especially if you are feeling symptomatic, a cough, a sore throat, a temperature.
The latest headline I have seen identifies grocery stores as 'the tipping point' of the transmission of the virus.
Supermarket trolley handles come in for particular censure in the article that runs beneath the headline. The advice that follows suggests that it is wise to sanitise before handling the trolley, whilst pushing the trolley and after putting the trolley back into its station and especially if, as in some supermarkets, you then retrieve a one pound coin.
But we still have to eat, and we are able to leave our homes at least once a day for the 'essential' purpose of 'hunter gathering' which has always since the earliest days of humanity been a risky business.
One of the world's most well known 'self isolators' was Julian of Norwich.
Walled into her cell in St Julian's Church in her home city of Norwich, Julian witnessed amongst other things the effects of the Black Death, whilst she herself was seriously ill she had a number of visions or 'shewings' of Christ's Passion which she then described in two works of religious literature entitled, The Revelation of Divine Love'.
Her influence was seen both in her lifetime and continues to this day.
T S Eliot the Poet was influenced by Julian's writings in his poem, The Four Quartets where he quotes in the poem Little Gidding:
Sin is Behovely, but
All shall be well, and
All manner of things shall be well.
It is this refrain, all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well, that I found myself reflecting when I sat in the Anchorite's cell in the church that bears her name in Norwich and which I imagine, knowingly or unknowingly many people today are echoing in their self isolation.
Well for themselves, well for their families and well for their loved ones.
Of course not only is the church busier in some ways than ever despite the buildings being closed and the services being live streamed from the Vicars' study, but as in my parish, telephone trees and grocery and prescription collections are being actively developed across the parish, my now daily photograph and prayer on facebook is being liked by many people.
It is as Scotty might observe to Captain Kirk on the Starship Enterprise, ministry but not as we know it!
Politics also are causing us surprise, having elected a small state government, committed to social isolation (Brexit), low taxes and a rejection of expertise.
We now find ourselves with a large state government involving itself in the minute detail of our daily living, with daily briefings from 'experts' and a Chancellor now paying everyones wages or at least 80% of everyones wages.
Of course the Billionaires are lobbying to have the Stock Market bailed out, and some employers continue treating staff with contempt, but I hope that after the Covid 19 reviews start to bite, we begin to see more rational consideration of both the false promises of the Davos Generation, the responsibility of austerity which has left so many people in insecure employment and the NHS in particular underfunded and gave rise to the embracing of Brexit by demonising immigrants, raising drawbridges and telling us that we had had enough of experts.
I suspect that, only if enough of us come to our senses soon enough, once this is over then I might risk daring to believe that:
All will be well!
Whilst there I was hired by a Church in Somerville to take Holy Communion to 'the shut ins' I was paid fifty dollars a trip, provided with a car and driver and picked up from and taken back home to my apartment.
I wasn't too sure about the designation 'shut in' as most of the communicants were elderly people, unable to attend Church, but still valued as members of the church community, I wondered about a better choice of name.
But I guess we're all 'shut ins' now?
Self isolation is the preferred designation. Most of our isolation is voluntary and we remain indoors for a variety of reasons.
Self preservation is probably at the top of most peoples list.
But staying home, remaining shut in, self isolating can be seen as an 'act of love' especially if you are feeling symptomatic, a cough, a sore throat, a temperature.
The latest headline I have seen identifies grocery stores as 'the tipping point' of the transmission of the virus.
Supermarket trolley handles come in for particular censure in the article that runs beneath the headline. The advice that follows suggests that it is wise to sanitise before handling the trolley, whilst pushing the trolley and after putting the trolley back into its station and especially if, as in some supermarkets, you then retrieve a one pound coin.
But we still have to eat, and we are able to leave our homes at least once a day for the 'essential' purpose of 'hunter gathering' which has always since the earliest days of humanity been a risky business.
One of the world's most well known 'self isolators' was Julian of Norwich.
Walled into her cell in St Julian's Church in her home city of Norwich, Julian witnessed amongst other things the effects of the Black Death, whilst she herself was seriously ill she had a number of visions or 'shewings' of Christ's Passion which she then described in two works of religious literature entitled, The Revelation of Divine Love'.
Her influence was seen both in her lifetime and continues to this day.
T S Eliot the Poet was influenced by Julian's writings in his poem, The Four Quartets where he quotes in the poem Little Gidding:
Sin is Behovely, but
All shall be well, and
All manner of things shall be well.
It is this refrain, all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well, that I found myself reflecting when I sat in the Anchorite's cell in the church that bears her name in Norwich and which I imagine, knowingly or unknowingly many people today are echoing in their self isolation.
Well for themselves, well for their families and well for their loved ones.
Of course not only is the church busier in some ways than ever despite the buildings being closed and the services being live streamed from the Vicars' study, but as in my parish, telephone trees and grocery and prescription collections are being actively developed across the parish, my now daily photograph and prayer on facebook is being liked by many people.
It is as Scotty might observe to Captain Kirk on the Starship Enterprise, ministry but not as we know it!
Politics also are causing us surprise, having elected a small state government, committed to social isolation (Brexit), low taxes and a rejection of expertise.
We now find ourselves with a large state government involving itself in the minute detail of our daily living, with daily briefings from 'experts' and a Chancellor now paying everyones wages or at least 80% of everyones wages.
Of course the Billionaires are lobbying to have the Stock Market bailed out, and some employers continue treating staff with contempt, but I hope that after the Covid 19 reviews start to bite, we begin to see more rational consideration of both the false promises of the Davos Generation, the responsibility of austerity which has left so many people in insecure employment and the NHS in particular underfunded and gave rise to the embracing of Brexit by demonising immigrants, raising drawbridges and telling us that we had had enough of experts.
I suspect that, only if enough of us come to our senses soon enough, once this is over then I might risk daring to believe that:
All will be well!
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