Stay At Home

“God must really love drunks and fools; he made so many of them.”

Frank Flynn

Yes. We know the idea isn’t original to my father. A French version dates to at least 1708.

A more contemporary version might be:

“God must love drunks, fools and really stupid,
self-appointed religious leaders who deny and defy science.
He made so many of them.”

Lest we be accused of unfairly picking on non-Anglicans and non-Roman Catholics, let’s start with the North Carolina priest who, in the midst of a statewide COVID-19 lockdown prohibiting gatherings of more than ten people, despite the directives of his bishop and the modeling of Pope Francis, celebrated an “amazingly wonderful” and “Solemn High Traditional Latin Mass of the Easter Vigil.” More than twenty-two people were reportedly observed entering the church. Guess he must have known better than the Holy Father and his medical advisors.

Then there’s the Metropolitan (head) of the Ukrainian Monastery of the Caves who encouraged believers, “Everyone hurry to church, read the Psalms, the Gospel, embrace one another… The most terrible epidemic is the sin that destroys human nature.” Weeks later more than 140 monks - including the Metropolitan - tested positive and three had died of the virus - rates exponentially higher than the rest of the nation. By late April four Moscow-aligned Ukrainian Orthodox monasteries were virus hotspots.

In the States, there were the Kentucky ministers who disobeyed the state’s warning against congregating; they claimed that they had to maintain the “spiritual health” of their members. Or, the Virginia pastor who ignored stay-at-home orders and assured his congregation that, if they believed in God, they could avoid infection. And, let us not ignore that Miami “pastor” who urged is flock to continue attending in-person services: “Do you believe God would bring his people to his house to be contagious with the virus? Of course not.”

I’m sorry. 

But that’s not only dangerously foolish. It’s borderline heresy!

Churches around the world use The Common Lectionary – a collection of readings from the Old Testament, including the Psalms, and selections from the New Testament - for Sunday worship services. Every major denomination in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, as well as Italy, Australia and the Philippines share the same readings on a three-year cycle. 

Traditionally, the Gospel for the First Sunday in Lent is the story of the devil’s three temptations of Jesus - Matthew 4:1-11. In the second temptation, the devil transports Jesus to the pinnacle of the Temple in Jerusalem and challenges him to “throw yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you’ and ‘on their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” Jesus responded by citing Deuteronomy 6:16 - “It is written, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

When the bubonic plague hit Wittenberg, Germany in August 1527, the reformer Martin Luther refused the order of the Elector of Saxony, John the Steadfast, to flee the city. Instead, Luther and his pregnant wife, Katharina, opened their home as a ward or hospice for the sick. 

In response to an inquiry from one of his contemporaries, Luther explored the difference between caring for one’s neighbor – in the fashion of today’s doctors, nurses, hospital employees and first responders – and taking the steps necessary to protect the community at large. One must not leave his neighbor unattended and uncared for: “[N]o one should dare leave his neighbor unless there are others who will take care of the sick in their stead and nurse them… we are bound to each other in such a way that no one may forsake the other in his distress but is obliged to assist and help he as he would like to be helped… It would be well to maintain hospitals staffed with people to take care of the sick so that patients from private homes can be sent there.”

Luther emphasized the importance of medicine, disinfecting homes, and avoiding risks of contamination – “I shall avoid places and persons where my presence is not needed in order not to become contaminated.” Almost five 500 years before CORVID-19, Luther recognized the common wisdom of social distancing and isolation and avoided infecting others and causing their death through his “negligence.” 

Luther would have no tolerance for 21st Century pastors who violate stay-at-home and no-crowd orders. Like the so-called “pastor” (I used quotation marks because the Good Shepherd would not lead his flock into danger.) in Louisiana who showed off his ankle monitor while conducting his third-Sunday-in-a-row service in violation of the state’s mandate to avoid large gatherings. For Luther, “a God-fearing faith is neither brash nor foolhardy and does not tempt God.” 

By 21st Century standards, the Levitical injunctions concerning the “cleansing” of individuals and houses with the “plague” of leprosy (Hansen’s Disease) were more than primitively superstitious; they were the equivalent of through-the-skin blue light infusions and ingesting Lysol. At the same time, however, Leviticus required social distancing and quarantines to prevent the spread of the disease and, concerning the 16th Century pandemic, Luther argued, “We must do the same with this dangerous pestilence” to avoid infecting others and causing their deaths. 

Luther wrote:

If one makes no use of intelligence or medicine when he could do so without detriment to his neighbor, such a person injures his body and must beware lest he become a suicide in God’s eyes. By the same reasoning a person might forego eating and drinking, clothing and shelter, and boldly proclaim his faith that if God wanted to preserve him from starvation and cold, he could do so without food and clothing. Actually that would be suicide. It is even more shameful for a person to pay no heed to his own body and to fail to protect it against the plague the best he is able, and then to infect and poison others who might have remained alive if he had taken care of his body as he should have. He is thus responsible before God for his neighbor’s death and is a murderer many times over. Indeed, such people behave as though a house were burning in the city and nobody were trying to put the fire out. Instead they give leeway to the flames so that the whole city is consumed, saying that if God so willed, he could save the city without water to quench the fire.

Wow!

Three cheers for Rev. Francis James Grimke, leader of the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. and considered one of the leading African-American clergy of his era who, in the wake of the Plague of 1918-1919 wrote:

“… conditions may arise in a community which justify the extraordinary exercise of powers that would not be tolerated under ordinary circumstances. This extraordinary exercise of power was resorted to be the Commissioners in closing up the theaters, schools, churches, in forbidding all gatherings of any considerable number of people indoors and outdoors, and in restricting the numbers who should be present even at funerals. The ground of the exercise of this extraordinary power was found in the imperative duty to safeguard, as far as possible, the health of the community by preventing the disease from which we were suffering. There has been considerable grumbling, I know, on the part of some, particularly in regard to the closing of the churches. It seems to me, however, in a matter like this it is always wise to submit to such restrictions for the time being. If, as a matter of fact, it was dangerous to meet in theaters and in  schools, it certainly was no less dangerous to meet in churches. The fact that the churches were places of religious gathering, and the others not, would not affect in the least the health question involved. If avoiding crowds lessens the danger of being infected, it was wise to take the precaution and not needlessly run in danger, and expect God to protect us.

In response to the same plague, Birmingham Methodist revivalist George R. Stuart addressed “Intelligent Christians,” encouraging them to trust science rather than to “tempt God to perform a miracle in the preservation of our health. Christians do not discount their faith in the omnipotence of their God by keeping their bodies and homes and streets clean and nongerm producing; by using care in traffic and travel, accepting vaccination, sprays and disinfectants and keeping God’s own laws of health and life. Any other course is the fruit of ignorance and false teaching.”

So, to those “ministers” and “pastors,” priests and metropolitans who are disregarding – violating – social distancing and crowd-size limiting injunctions….

Perhaps it is time to read and learn from the fourth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel or Leviticus or Martin Luther or Francis James Grimke or George R. Stuart.

Stay home and lead by telling those who would follow you to do the same. Stay home and be good shepherds to your flocks.

And, to the People of God: Stay home this Sunday. In fact, stay home every Sunday until it is truly safe to “congregate” again. Stay home. Enjoy the sun on your face while avoiding crowded parks and beaches. Marvel at rainbows. Turn summersaults in the grass. Dance in the rain.  Jump in muddle puddles and splash in pools of water. And remember, God is EVERYWHERE and Jesus has promised “I am with you always. Yes! ‘til the end of time.” (Matthew 28:20)