By Lou Zeller, Executive Director
The test of our time is raised in sharp relief by the
corona virus; that is, the manner in which we confront the plague which has
claimed four hundred thousand lives in the U.S. alone and over two million
worldwide.
But will we set our sights
high enough? Or will we settle for the possible? Justice and simple fairness
require more.
The encyclical letter of Pope Francis, quoted below, takes
issue with the business-as-usual approach to international relations, an
observation extending beyond public health.
“We
are reminded of the well-known verse of the poet Virgil that evokes the ‘tears
of things,’ the misfortunes of life and history. All too quickly, however, we forget the
lessons of history, ‘the teacher of life.’ Once this health crisis passes, our
worst response would be to plunge even more deeply into feverish consumerism
and new forms of egotistic self-preservation . . .. If only we might keep in
mind all those elderly persons who died for lack of respirators, partly as a
result of the dismantling, year after year, of healthcare systems.” [1]
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. invoked thunder with
his sermon most often remembered as accepting of a drum major for justice;
however, only as an exception and otherwise unapproving of self-centered drum
majors. In his sermon, he was critical of the world’s major drummer, saying,
“But this is why we are drifting. And we are drifting there because nations are
caught up with the drum major instinct. ‘I must be first.’ ‘I must be supreme.’
‘Our nation must rule the world.’ And I
am sad to say that the nation in which we live is the supreme culprit. And I'm
going to continue to say it to America, because I love this country too much to
see the drift that it has taken.” [2]
Recent reports on COVID-19 vaccines by the World Health
Organization lambast widespread profit-seeking and favoring of the rich over
the poor. Healthier adults in wealthy countries
are getting vaccinated before older people or health care workers in poorer
countries. WHO’s Director-General Tedros said, “Just 25 doses have been given
in one lowest income country—not 25 million, not 25,000—just 25. I need to be
blunt: The world is on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure.” The people
he referred to are in the west African nation of Guinea.[3]
Pope Francis offers further insights, based on meetings
with Grand Imam Ahmad Al-Tayyeb and representatives of many faiths, recognizing
all human beings as equal in rights, duties and dignity. He said:
“True,
a worldwide tragedy like the Covid-19 pandemic momentarily revived the sense
that we are a global community, all in the same boat, where one person’s
problems are the problems of all . . .. If everything is connected, it is hard
to imagine that this global disaster is unrelated to our way of approaching
reality, our claim to be absolute masters of our own lives and of all that
exists . . .. The world is itself crying out in rebellion.” [1]
In Virgil’s epic poem, Aeneas sees a mural that depicts
battles of the Trojan War and the deaths of his friends and countrymen. Aeneas
is moved to tears and says, “There are tears of things and mortal things touch
the mind.” [4]
Pope Francis concludes, “If only this immense sorrow may
not prove useless but enable us to take a step forward towards a new style of
life. If only we might rediscover once for all that we need one another, and
that in this way our human family can experience a rebirth, with all its faces,
all its hands and all its voices, beyond the walls that we have erected.” [1]
- - -
[1] Encyclical Letter, “Fratelli Tutti” Pope Francis on
Fraternity and Social Friendship, October 3, 2020
[2] Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Sermon Delivered at
Ebenezer Baptist Church, Atlanta, Georgia, on 4 February 1968
[3] “WHO chief lambasts vaccine profits, demands elderly go
first,” Associated Press, 1/18/2021
[4] The Aeneid, Book I, line 462
The test of our time is raised in sharp relief by the corona virus; that is, the manner in which we confront the plague which has claimed four hundred thousand lives in the U.S. alone and over two million worldwide.
But will we set our sights high enough? Or will we settle for the possible? Justice and simple fairness require more.
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