In Response to Covid

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When someone close to you dies, it is natural and acceptable to grieve, for as long as you need to. However, that personal grief does little to prepare us for grief on a grand scale, for now we grieve the deaths of millions of faceless strangers around the world. And grieve we must, to acknowledge the tremendous loss of life that we have been faced with.

Since we started burying our dead one hundred thirty thousand years ago, mankind has had a complicated relationship with death. We fear the inevitable demise of ourselves and our loved ones, but respect that death is something everyone must face eventually. In some cases, especially when death could have easily been avoided, we rail uselessly against it, and will fight to stave it off as long as possible.

When somebody we know does pass on, we memorialize them as best we know how, for as long as we can. We must honor those unknown millions who succumbed to the greatest pandemic of our time. We reflect on how many may have been spared had they taken appropriate precautions, and how many did all the right things and were still taken. With Patience and Compassion, we pay tribute to the fallen, although we may never know their names.

Namaste.

Reverend CJ Carlin

September 6, 2021

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