Pandemic 2020: Day 136 (1.87 M cases/ 108K deaths)
Another day dawns with the hope that the uptick in the coronavirus pandemic infections and deaths has stalled. Sadly. that is not the case. Since Monday, 20,073 plus more people have been diagnosed with the disease and 1,039 more individuals have succumbed to it. Along side this news continues that of the civil unrest and protests in response to the pandemic of racism. The tension and protests have expanded beyond the shores of the United States to other countries who join us in our cries and demands for an end to racist policies and procedures directed toward people of color.
As with most protests, scenes of the marchers with their signs and banners walking peacefully are sometimes overtaken by others which depict unnecessary violence and looting; expressions which do nothing to advance the purposes of the lawfully assembled voicing valid grievances. On the contrary, images of violence by protestors and police contradict the principles of our democracy and our identity as a Christian nation. Perhaps that is why, try as I might, I cannot erase the image of the United States President posing for a photo op in front a church brandishing the Holy Bible in his hand; as if it were a sword. Arranging for the photo to be taken required national military to clear a path through peaceful protestors. The ensuing debacle of officers riding through the crowd and tossing tear gas cannisters to disperse it was a picture of a nation in its capitol city gone mad; the madness of the moment generated by the madness of a president who chose to walk across the park where the protestors were gathered as a show, I surmise, of his power to do so.
Perhaps he might be excused for exercising poor judgment once he stood in front of that sacred edifice if he had opened the Bible and read aloud scriptures that speak to healing and forgiveness and love; if he had seized that moment to apologize for his divisive, hurtful words and twits, for the chaos his walking over had just caused; if he had voiced solidarity with the people and demanded justice for the family of George Floyd whose death at the hands of police generated the current uprising; if had called for the immediate prosecution of those officers to the fullest extent of the law; if he had said, “I’m sorry;” if he had bowed his knee and his head and prayed. But as we know, he did none of those things. Instead he failed the test of leadership in a Christian nation and lost a historic moment to change his legacy.
As I watched the replays of the video that captured that defining moment, I thought of those rulers in our biblical history who committed sacrileges in God’s holy places of worship; of their arrogance in taking the holy things of temple and using them for secular purposes; not as God had ordained. The Gospel of Matthew reads, “My house shall be called a house of prayer...” (Matthew 21:13) How damming is this image of the ruler of this country using God’s house of prayer and God’s holy word for a photo op! I cannot imagine that such sacrilege will go unpunished. “For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthened hearts that are fully committed to him. You have done a foolish thing, and from now on you will be at war.” (2 Chronicles 16:9) These words to King Asa recorded in the chronicles of the kings of Judah seem so appropriate to this moment. Since his foolish gesture for a foolish reason in front of God’s house, I believe this president will continue to be at war with the people he was elected to govern and with the world at large.
“The eyes of the Lord are everywhere, keeping watch on the wicked and the good.” (Proverbs 15:3) May we strive daily to be among “the good.”
Love. Joy. Peace.