This is Not the Way it Was Supposed to be
It’s prom time, except there are no proms. Next month is graduation time, except there will be no graduation ceremonies. Weddings were planned, but have been postponed. Services celebrating the lives of loved ones passed on are restricted to immediate family members. Hospital patients have no visitors; people who were receiving regular paychecks have been laid off; doctors and nurses in metropolitan areas are overworked and, in some cases, under protected.
Yet, in the midst of all of this “not rightness,” good-hearted people are making it right. Collectively, we are finding new and creative ways to celebrate our graduates, comfort the bereaved, remember the sick and isolated, and help those who have lost jobs.
In an ad hoc ceremony at a local hospital third year nursing students about to receive their RN degrees were applauded by staff and onlookers as they left the hospital building. Their graduation celebration turned into a graduation appreciation.
Signs appear regularly in front of hospitals and health care facilities saying, “Heroes work here.” Neighbors bring food in to feed these modern day rock stars, and gifted seamstresses are sewing masks for their protection.
Workers who are often forgotten: grocery store stockers and clerks, truck drivers, sanitation people, postal workers (and UPS and FedEx and all the rest), and farmers are being appreciated as never before.
A local tattoo artist, whose shop had to close, set up a Go Fund Me page and raised money to feed the hungry in his community. With help from his friends, he now serves several hundred meals a day three days a week.
One church turned its outdoor lending library into a free bread and toilet paper station where neighbors can contribute or take what they need. Each day it is filled with food, bread and toilet paper, and each morning it is close to empty.
Family members of deceased loved ones are sharing memories through videos, allowing friends to remember with them virtually. Friends are calling, texting, emailing and mailing condolences.
People isolated in hospitals or at home find comfort through calls and cards, and patients say hospital staffs become their families as they recover.
Churches are keeping their flocks together through online services, special Bible studies and online events during the week. Zoom meetings keep small groups together and feeling connected.
Through these (and so many other) thoughts, words and deeds, people are caring, helping, reaching out, encouraging, honoring, feeding, nourishing, and strengthening others. In the midst of a bad situation, where things are not the way they are supposed to be, let’s think about the good resulting from this difficult time. St. Paul reminds us “[W]hatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”
The opportunity to help make it right allows all who accept the challenge the chance to be a part of something bigger than ourselves and become better human beings in the process.
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