Month: November 2021

Time to Share

‘If you have two shirts, give one to the poor.  If you have food, share it with those who are hungry’ – John the Baptist, Luke 3:11

The news hit the day after Thanksgiving.  As tens of millions of Americans rushed to stores and online to take advantage of Black Friday sales, the World Health Organization released news about the dreaded Omicron Variant.  Stock markets plunged, travel restrictions were imposed, and supply lines came to a stand-still.  Suddenly, the prospect of a post-Thanksgiving/holiday Covid surge took on dire new dimensions as people contemplated the news that the new variant boasts a ‘constellation of mutations’ that may enable it to evade both vaccine and natural immunity. 

The jury is still out on just how bad this really is, so it is premature to panic.  It may well be the case, one can hope, that this will turn out to be much ado about nothing.  Nonetheless, the arrival of a new ‘variant of concern’ offers an opportunity to reflect on the world’s response to the pandemic, in particular the failure of the wealthier nations to share their vaccine blessedness with less affluent countries. 

Omicron has its origins in South Africa, a nation with a relatively low vaccination rate (35%).  Poorer African nations are more severely under-vaccinated.  Nigeria, for example, has a rate of 1.7%.  Ethiopia, 1.3%.  The Democratic Republic of Congo is at 2.1%.  The continent as a whole stands at around 4%, with poorer nations averaging, as the examples cited evidence, less than 2%. 

And that’s just Africa.  Poorer countries around the world are overwhelmingly unvaccinated. 

As a Christian, I find this appalling, as I hope you do too.  Two reasons, the first being basic fairness.  John the Baptist’s observation about sharing clothing and food seems to apply to vaccines just as well.  In wealthier nations, including the United States, we throw expired vaccines away every day.  We have far more than we need (even if the persistently stubborn were to break down and take a needle, we would have plenty).  Seven days ago, America reached the point where 36% of Americans had received a third dose of the vaccine.  I myself am so boosted, a decision I weighed carefully, considering the very topic I am currently addressing. I decided to get the shot because they were abundant here in the states and, given the current state of vaccine hesitancy, would go bad if not used.  It did pain me somewhat to know I was getting a third shot when hundreds of millions have yet to get one. 

This widespread availability of the vaccine at home, and the receipt of boosters, is not necessarily a cause for hand wringing.  Citizens of wealthier nations could, if we set our collective mind to it, provide more than enough vaccine for both ourselves and the world.  I am no expert, and I am sure there are deep complexities involved, but two steps in particular seem in order.  First, wealthier nations could simply create a Marshall-type plan on Covid and appropriate billions of dollars to the purchase and deployment of vaccines throughout the world.  Second, the Pharmaceutical companies that created the available vaccines could release their patents, enabling vaccines to be developed at a faster pace throughout the world.  Pope Francis called for such a step in October, calling on Pharmaceutical companies to ‘Make a gesture of humanity and allow every country, every people, every human being, to have access to the vaccines.’

‘Oh but we can’t spend our money distributing vaccines everywhere!’ I can hear some say.  ‘We need to make sure we have enough vaccine to protect ourselves!  Not everyone is vaccinated here.  America first!’  Putting aside that Americans here have had plenty of time to get vaccinated, this argument is hollow, self-serving, and certainly contrary to the teachings of Jesus.  I love the story of Jesus and the Syro-Phoenician woman in the Gospels.  A foreigner came to Jesus asking for healing for her daughter.  Jesus, knowing his disciples’ prejudices, initially put her off by saying he had come for the children of Israel, not outsiders, thereby revealing the ugliness of the disciples’ nationalist, ‘Israel first’ mentality.  When she persisted in her pleas for help, Jesus delivered the woman’s daughter to wholeness.  There are many lessons in the story, but among them is the realization that Jesus didn’t just offer ‘healthcare’ to those close to home.  He made it available wherever it was needed.    

As for the release of patents, I am sure that I (and the Pope) will be accused of naivete.  Do you not understand the nature of the pharmaceutical industry?  Or the precedent it would set for the future?  Why should companies that invest millions, even billions, not be able to reap the rewards of their labor.  To tamper with the invisible hand of the Pharmaceutical marketplace would be to denigrate capitalism.  Well, in the first place, these vaccines were produced, at least in the United States (and I’m sure elsewhere) in part with public money, aka taxpayer dollars.  And in the second place, this is a crisis moment in which millions of lives are at stake.  If Big Pharma chooses profits over human lives at such a time as this, it will reveal the moral bankruptcy of its corporate soul and deserve whatever government encroachment on their turf ensues.  As far as I’m concerned, if they will not release their patents voluntarily, they should be made to do so.  Cries of socialism be damned. 

The second reason I find the current state of vaccine disparity so appalling is this: it is not only morally wrong; it is galactically stupid.  Failure to stop the spread of this mutating virus throughout the world means it will have more opportunities to metamorphose as it spreads, producing ever more variants of concern, each potentially more virulent than the last.  We are flipping out over the Omicron variant at present.  One wonders what happens by the time we get to the last letter of the Greek alphabet.  The Omega variant might be one that lives up to its name, to the horror of us all. 

The wealthier nations and the Pharmaceutical companies have a choice.  We can do the right thing, save millions of lives, and in the process save ourselves.   Or we can forsake the advice of John the Baptist to share, cling to what is ours, and watch the world descend into a chaos of our own making. 

It’s time to listen to the Baptizer.  It’s time to share.  If we don’t, we may all live to regret it. 

Under Christ’s Mercy,

Brent

Make Decency Normal Again

‘You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder.  If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’  But I say to you, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment!  If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court.  And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell’ – Jesus, in Matthew 5:21-22 (NLT)

According to Jesus, words matter.  The things we say, the things we suggest, have meaning, both for those who hear them and for the state of own hearts.  Holding another person in contempt, such as we evidence when we call someone a disparaging name or curse them, is serious business.  Sticks and stones may break our bones, but when we say things that put another person’s physical, spiritual, emotional, or psychological well-being in danger, we imperil our very souls.  Treating people with decency and respect, valuing them as fellow pilgrims on the journey of life, holding them up instead of tearing them down, even when we are talking about those with whom we may have reason to disagree, matters to Jesus. 

Yesterday, the United States House of Representatives voted to censure one of its members.  You probably know the story.  Representative Paul Gosar from Arizona had posted on Twitter a doctored anime video depicting himself flying through the air with a sword and slashing at the neck of New York’s Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.  In the video, blood sprays from the wound as AOC’s neck snaps back, lifeless, and dead.  Gosar then turns his attention to President Joe Biden, his next apparent victim. 

Decency in political discourse seems to be on its last legs in this country, but even so, this was beyond the pale.  In defense of the motion to censure Gosar, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi remarked, ‘We can’t have members [of the House] joking about killing one another.’  That such a defense had to be made at all is illustrative of how bad things have become in America. 

Not surprisingly (I wish I could say something like ‘shockingly’ here), Pelosi’s view of the matter was not supported by the members of Gosar’s party, all but three of whom voted against censure (two, Representatives Liz Cheny and Adam Kinzinger admirably voted in favor, a third Republican Congressman, David Joyce, who ironically serves on the House Ethics Committee, voted ‘present’ – hardly a profile in courage there).  To many opposed to the motion, the video was ‘just a joke.’  How on earth it can be considered acceptable to joke about murdering a woman (or anyone for that matter), I cannot begin to understand.  But when you consider further that AOC has been vilified by conservatives and right wing zealots for years (the former’s rhetoric fueling the hate of the latter; the two groups are becoming increasingly indistinguishable), that as a result she receives a daily briefing each morning about the latest threats against her life, that, on January 6th, she was among those most likely to be murdered (or worse) by the insurrectionists at the Capitol, one might think that, perhaps, Republicans would realize the dangers of such a ‘joke,’ and that, further considering Gosar’s affiliations with neo-Nazis and right wing thugs, it wasn’t a joke at all but a calculated attempt to raise the temperature of hate against a rival, liberal member of Congress, her safety be damned.  There certainly wasn’t anything funny about that video.  In fact, if you or I had posted it, we almost surely would have received a visit from the Secret Service. 

I can hear the conservative AOC haters now: but she’s a Socialist!  This was just meant to highlight how dangerous she is; that we are at war for the soul of our country (this has actually been said in defense of Gosar).  Come off it.  I don’t care if AOC is a strident Communist (which she isn’t).  You don’t treat anyone like this.  Not if your Mama raised you right.  And especially not if you claim to be a follower of Jesus, who, remember, demands that we not speak or act in ways that hold others in contempt or risk placing their lives in peril. 

In support of the motion, AOC took the floor and gave a speech that is exactly what our country needs to hear as it continues to slouch toward the annihilation of decency.  You can watch her speech here.  I urge you to do so.  I would go so far as to say that, whatever your politics are, if you can listen to her words and disagree with her on this matter, if you can listen to her words and continue to defend someone like Gosar, if you can listen to her words and continue to believe that it is acceptable to treat anyone the way she has been treated by Trumpian political operatives, then, to paraphrase a friend of mine, your moral compass, if you ever had one in the first place, is irretrievably broken, and you need to get yourself a new one. 

I am glad the censure motion passed but disappointed that it did not pass unanimously.  It is a sad day indeed when Congress, a body that I, like AOC, was once taught to hold in the highest regard, cannot even agree to protect the safety of its own members, when political disagreements are resolved, not in a spirit of civility and common unity, but with vicious attacks and diatribes, if not full on violence, and when such attacks, diatribes, and violence are defended, almost to a person, by one of America’s two political parties. 

I take some consolation that, at least for now, a low bar has been set: it is not acceptable for members of Congress to even joke about murdering one another.  That the bar is so low is enough to make one weep.  I can only hope that this small step might be part of a longer journey to make decency, if not great, at least normal again. 

Under Christ’s Mercy,

Brent

New Book Released!

I’m happy to announce that my book, The Challenger: Faith, Love, and Resistance in the Gospel of Mark is now available in both Kindle and Paperback versions on Amazon. Many of you have been reading a few advance posts from the book over the past year or so, now all of the Gospel entries are finished and complete in one volume. It can be read straight through, as a daily devotional, or simply used as a resource for bible study. I hope some of you will check out this ‘subversive commentary’ on Mark’s Gospel. And please, share the news! I believe this book will add to people’s understanding of Jesus’ message and call to challenge the status quo of our world. Just click the image below (or the link above) and you will be taken to my book’s page on amazon. Happy reading!

Conservatives Save Nation from Onslaught of Muppet Propaganda

Attention all Patriots and Lovers of Freedom!

Texas Senator Ted Cruz expressed outrage this week after Sesame Street’s Big Bird proudly tweeted (on twitter that is) about having received his Covid-19 inoculation, noting that his wing was sore, but it was worth it to keep himself and others healthy.  The Senator responded with a tweet of his own labeling the over-sized fowl’s public service announcement ‘government propaganda for five-year-olds.’ 

Immediately, the forces of American conservativism sprang into action, backing Cruz and launching an immediate raid on the Children’s Television Workshop, long suspected of harboring radicals hell bent on indoctrinating children with left-wing values (such as sharing, caring, treating people who are different from you with kindness, singing the alphabet, and discovering which of four things is not like the other).

Said raid revealed that Big Bird’s tweet was merely the tip of the iceberg.  The CTW had numerous shocking public service announcements in the works, several of which were stopped in the course of production.  In one, Oscar the Grouch was to have pontificated on the upside of recycling in a song entitled, ‘How I Love [to Separate] Trash.’  Cookie Monster, who recently returned from a health spa for treatment after being diagnosed with advanced type II diabetes, had been rehearsing a speech to children on the benefits of moderation and healthy eating habits. Grover, dressed in classic ‘Super-Grover’ garb, was caught purple handed working on a monologue concerning the importance of wearing a helmet and other safety equipment when flying or crashing into solid objects.  Snuffleupagus had a script for a piece against the ivory trade, and, most dastardly of all, Kermit the Frog was found filming a companion project on climate change and biodiversity, in which he planned to explain to children that it is in fact, despite his previous contention, quite easy being green. 

Rest assured, honest Americans, each of these projects has been stopped in their tracks, thereby saving the nation’s children from a future marked by community responsibility, healthy eating habits, safety, and the sound stewardship of planet earth. 

At a press conference today, Senator Cruz thanked his colleagues for their quick action.  ‘Had we not acted when we did, who knows what else the CTW might have attempted?  While they weren’t found at the studio, I shudder to think what Bert and Ernie might have been working on.’ 

Cruz and his colleagues plan to visit Nickelodeon Studios next, having received a tip that SpongeBob SquarePants might be up to no good. 

Note: the first paragraph of this post is true.  Click here for the story.