Seeking The Light
Where to begin? Where, oh where to begin?
Let’s start with Kindness and, for Kindness’ sake, we won’t use some names. But. Because others have been well publicized, well…
Dallas.
Did you see those folks? Hundreds, maybe a thousand of them with their umbrellas and folding chairs gathered on a rainy first Tuesday in November, near the Grassy Knoll and Dallas’ Dealey Plaza. “We’re expecting a parade,” a woman who drove from Nebraska told Rolling Stone. “JFK is going to be here.”
These folks genuinely believed that JFK, Jr. would reveal that he has switched political parties and announce that is running with former president Donald Trump in 2024; after winning the election, Trump will step down and Jr. will assume the presidency, appointing Trump’s former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn as his vice president. Trump will then become “king of kings” – whatever that means.
Other parade-expecters, were anticipating the return of Michael Jackson and Robin Williams, Kobe Bryant, Debbie Reynolds and race car driver Dale Earnhardt. But the parade headliners were to be a father-and-son reappearance – JFK (who would have been 104 years old) and JFK, Jr., People’s 1988 “Sexiest Man Alive” and once described as looking like Michelangelo’s David’; he was killed piloting his six-seater plane in the Atlantic off Martha’s Vineyard in 1999; Navy divers found his and his wife’s and sister-in-law’s bodies the following day.
According to these true believers, he’s been living in Pittsburgh, where he’s employed as a financial services manager.
When the expected grand marshals no-showed, the true believers predicted their appearances later that day at a Dallas Rolling Stones concert. The expanding list of long-dead did not make the concert.
Yet, more than one-hundred “true believers” – some having abandoned marriages and children more than a month earlier – were still waiting in Dallas at the end of November.
Remember the “2012 Doomsday” apocalypse that didn’t happen – even though the 5,125 years beginning in 3114 B.C. of the Mayan calendar ran out on December 21?
And who can forget the infamous 1997 Heaven’s Gate folks who believed in UFOs and impending doom for which the only escape was to voluntarily “turn against the next level” by committing suicide. HG leaders Marshall Applewhite and Bonnie Nettles had an “evacuation” plan in which a fast-approaching UFO would transport them and their followers to “beyond.” Thirty-nine members of the group spent $10,000 on alien abduction insurance and committed suicide wearing “Heaven’s Gate Away Team” arm patches.
Some things are just too unbelievable to believe because, in the end, they result in death.
On to British Columbia, where one of Canada’s most prominent COVID-19 deniers, who was on trial in Supreme Court on three counts of violating federal quarantine legislation, was found dead by paramedics. In October, he posted a video in which he said he was experiencing a sore throat, fatigue and “so called ‘Convid’ (sic) symptoms”; he was coughing and spitting phlegm out his car window and claimed he did not have “CONVID” (sic) because “CONVID (sic) does not exist.” In his final video, he appears wearing a “Flat Earth Gang” sweatshirt as he rants about “tyranny,” “control” and “the system” while mocking people who accept the mainstream community’s beliefs about COVID. “Holy sh-t my throat is so sore,” he complains, noting his illness is getting worse. He reported using Ivermectin, a parasitic drug, to treat his illness.
He was on trial for failing to follow quarantine regulations after returning from a Flat Earth conference in South Carolina in October 2020 and violations of the Canadian Quarantine Act. At one point following his arrest, he blithely observed, “People die all the time” but they’re not dying of COVID because “COVID doesn’t exist.”
Vancouver Is Awesome opinion writer Robert Kronbauer, observed:
In the two weeks leading up to his death, the "flat earther" was displaying classic COVID-19 symptoms, yet continued running errands while live-streaming his thoughts to the internet. Some of those thoughts were that "CONvid" (his word for COVID-19) is not real, so he couldn't possibly have it.
What people don't know - or perhaps don't care to know - is that this man had a family, and was father to a young daughter… his child will now live her life without a dad. The grief that child is now feeling, and the pain they'll have to endure their entire life, could have been avoided if [he] were to have simply believed in science, then got treatment for what ailed him.
If he did in fact die from COVID-19, while denying he even had it and trying to treat himself with horse de-wormer, [he] died like he lived - senselessly.
The misinformation that he believed, and that he worked to spread on the internet and at rallies, may have ultimately cost him his life.
Then there’s Marcus Lamb, co-founder and CEO of the conservative Christian Daystar Television Network and vocal opponent of COVID-19 vaccines and restrictions. With an annual salary of half-a-million dollars and a total net worth estimated at $10 million, the Pentecostal anti-vaccine activist died on November 30, after battling the coronavirus in a prolonged hospitalization.
While Marcus was in hospital struggling with the consequences of COVID-19, his son Jonathan was on the Christian network describing his father’s infection as a “spiritual attack.” “There’s no doubt in my mind this is a spiritual attack from the enemy. As much as my parents have gone on here to kind of inform everyone about everything going on in the pandemic and some of the ways to treat Covid, there’s no doubt that the enemy is not happy about that, and he’s doing everything he can to take down my dad.”
Florida-based conservative radio host Dick Farrell declared in July that COVID-19 vaccines were “promoted by people who lied [to you] all along about masks, where the virus came from and the death toll.” He claimed vaccines were “Bogus Bull” and referred to the on-going pandemic as “SCAM DEMIC.” He had asked his listeners and Facebook followers if “hydroxychloroquine from Canada” is safe and declared “When a gubberment denies u access to HCQ [it is] obvious they want you dead.” He died in August of “severe damage” caused by COVID-19, after having texted a friend “Get it [the vaccine]!... I wish I had” gotten it.”
Broadcaster and operations manager Tod Tucker died on August 11, “following the onset of viral pneumonia as a result of COVID-`9,” according to the ALL ACCESS broadcasting network. In March he posted, “Please stop bragging that you got your COVID vaccine. What do you want us to say? ‘Congratulations lab rat?!”
Religious broadcaster Jimmy DeYoung, Sr. told his listeners the COVID-19 vaccines could “be another form of government control of the people” and declared that Pfizer was using their vaccine to commit “mass sterilization.” He died within days of Tucker.
Radio host Phil Valentine announced his COVID-19 diagnosis on July 11: “Unfortunately for the haters out there, it looks like I’m going to make it. Interesting experience…” Less than two weeks later, his Nashville radio station announced he was “in very serious condition, suffering from Covid pneumonia” and said he had had a change of heart, urging others to get the vaccine. He had previous bet that his odds of dying from COVID-19 were “way less than one percent.” He died in August. Interestingly, less than two weeks after his death, Cumulus Media, which owns the station where Valentine worked, issued a message to all employees that everyone working in corporate offices would be required to be vaccinated by October 11.
Self-described “Mr. Anti-Vax,” Marc Bernier also died of COVID-19 in August – roughly three weeks after contracting COVID-19.
But the [can we say?] crazies and Science-deniers are not restricted to folks still hanging around in Dealey Plaza and on conservative and religious radio.
In early November, San Francisco’s Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone presided at a Requiem Mass for the city’s homeless at St. Mary’s Cathedral to demonstrate “profound respect for the equal dignity of every human life.” One problem: The maskless archbishop was photographed talking to and shaking hands with people and less than a month later told The San Francisco Chronicle “We think of a vaccine as a shot that gives you immunity to a disease for life or at least for a very long time. And these [COVID-19 vaccines] don’t give any immunity at all. They give protection.” He went on to proclaim that his “immune system is strong,” and that his personal physician had told him “it’s probably not necessary for me to be vaccinated.”
Or there’s Jim Jordan, the Ohio Representative who’s always attempting to look super-macho by not wearing a suit coat, who, on December 2, declared via Twitter “Real America is done with #COVID19. The only people who don’t understand that are Fauci and Biden.” Unfortunately for their now-grieving families and friends, 104 Ohioans died that day.
Willful ignorance, personal arrogance, theological blindness and overwhelming hubris untethered to real science and rational thought are costing lives – in America and around the world.
Happily, Pope Francis has been a voice of reason: “Being vaccinated with vaccines authorized by competent authorities is an act of love. And contributing to ensure the majority of people are vaccinated is an act of love. Vaccination is a simple but profound way of promoting the common good and caring for each other, especially the most vulnerable.”
Taking solace in Pope Francis’ call to all to act in love and charity, we might do well to give living expression to the Advent prayer of Father Henri Nouwen
Lord Jesus, Master of both the light and the darkness,
send your Holy Spirit upon our preparations for Christmas.
We who have so much to do seek quiet spaces
to hear your voice each day.
We who are anxious over many things
look forward to your coming among us.
We who are blessed in so many ways
long for the complete joy of your kingdom.
We whose hearts are heavy
seek the joy of your presence.
We are your people, walking in darkness,
yet seeking the light.
To you we say, “Come Lord Jesus!”