Presence amid the pandemic

This is the HEART of my struggle. And what will likely drive me out to the community. The horizon beckons with a setting sun .... one setting on the space where we hunker down. I am beginning to hear and read discussions about risk in stepping out vs not.

Right now I manage. I manage for my father, for my son, and for his dad. I manage for my wife. I manage for my brothers. I manage for my young folks in order to continue leaving them packages and seeing ever so briefly their faces. Because I dont want to bring danger or death to their doorstep.

But when does my work, my CALL - the very one that changed my entire life - outweigh all of it? Here is where all of our groanings for justice hit the road. We can talk and read and learn about everything. We can be walking knowledge hounds. But that will NEVER replace the call to sit with those in mourning or devastated by the vagaries of life. "Presence is not just at the heart of Communion; it is at the heart of our faith. We show up for others. “I am with you” is the message Jesus embodied in life, death and beyond. But therein lies the tension during this coronavirus pandemic: To obey the greatest commandment to love God and neighbor, we must stay away from both the church and others."

She closes by talking about how community can be named in our screen togetherness. And how our imperfect doing of the sacrament of communion will be honored. That is at least a beginning framework for engaging how we as the church must change. But it can also be a back door to the thinking that says; we ask for forgiveness all the time for our imperfections. So...we get over it and offer online communion.

I say don't. At least not until you know God calls you and you have been able to grasp that the church is transforming and we are being called to renewal. Otherwise...I suspect you will feel just feel like..... Its okay...go ahead. Do something you believe is wrong...and ask for forgiveness later because we do it all the time anyway.