The past couple of days, our nation, state, church, schools, and all large gathering entities have pretty much shut down for at least the next two weeks to contain this virus that spreads so quickly. We have all stocked up (toilet paper has been the hardest commodity to come by) and are settling down to be home with our family or those we live with. Dad Young and I have been back and forth between our homes, and Dave is here (Mark is visiting from California with Dad Tueller, so he has come over a couple of times).
It is amazing to watch all the reactions and emotions of people on social media and television. I hope this experience unifies us and helps us all prioritize. I know there will be the few who don't respond well. I am just trying to be better and kinder and positive. I found this quote from C.S. Lewis from 1948 that applies well.
t's important to remember that no matter what trials come to us - the only really horrible thing that could happen is to betray ourselves by completely uncharitable actions. We have the freedom to choose how we From one of the wisest men of our age, C.S. Lewis -
In one way we think a great deal too much of the atomic bomb (coronavirus). “How are we to live in an atomic (coronavirus) age?” I am tempted to reply: “Why, as you would have lived in the sixteenth century when the plague visited London almost every year, or as you would have lived in a Viking age when raiders from Scandinavia might land and cut your throat any night; or indeed, as you are already living in an age of cancer, an age of syphilis, an age of paralysis, an age of air raids, an age of railway accidents, an age of motor accidents.”
In other words, do not let us begin by exaggerating the novelty of our situation. Believe me, dear sir or madam, you and all whom you love were already sentenced to death before the atomic bomb (coronavirus) was invented: and quite a high percentage of us were going to die in unpleasant ways. We had, indeed, one very great advantage over our ancestors—anesthetics; but we have that still. It is perfectly ridiculous to go about whimpering and drawing long faces because the scientists have added one more chance of painful and premature death to a world which already bristled with such chances and in which death itself was not a chance at all, but a certainty.
This is the first point to be made: and the first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.
I love how one of the wisest men of our age, C.S. Lewis, put it -
In one way we think a great deal too much of the atomic bomb (coronavirus). “How are we to live in an atomic (coronavirus) age?” I am tempted to reply: “Why, as you would have lived in the sixteenth century when the plague visited London almost every year, or as you would have lived in a Viking age when raiders from Scandinavia might land and cut your throat any night; or indeed, as you are already living in an age of cancer, an age of syphilis, an age of paralysis, an age of air raids, an age of railway accidents, an age of motor accidents.”
In other words, do not let us begin by exaggerating the novelty of our situation. Believe me, dear sir or madam, you and all whom you love were already sentenced to death before the atomic bomb (coronavirus) was invented: and quite a high percentage of us were going to die in unpleasant ways. We had, indeed, one very great advantage over our ancestors—anesthetics; but we have that still. It is perfectly ridiculous to go about whimpering and drawing long faces because the scientists have added one more chance of painful and premature death to a world which already bristled with such chances and in which death itself was not a chance at all, but a certainty.
This is the first point to be made: and the first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.
— “On Living in an Atomic Age” (1948) in Present Concerns: Journalistic Essays
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