Living in Coronavirusworld 241: One day closer

 

1/17

What we need

Our ZOOM meeting with my mother in her assisted care facility is filled with tech issues. My mom's been left with only "speaker view" so she can't understand why people keep disappearing. Explaining is not easy. The transcript would be an entertaining slice of Coronavirusworld life one act.  My niece, a middle school principle in Ohio, says "So now you know what it's like trying. to teach these days."

The Gate has added outdoor heaters, like more and more restaurants every day. But heated tables are in high demand so my friend and I are luck to get an unheated table at the corner. Where the wind whips around. I stick with Jameson's but she goes with a hot toddy. And a shepherd's pie for me  to keep warm. We can make it just about an hour in this weather.  When I go in to pay the bill, owner Paul is happy for our loyalty. Shots are shared.

1/18

Coffee, pastry and Sunday Times at my favorite Venezuelan cafe. But the wind keeps rustling my paper and cooling my coffee so its a short visit. 

As our family gathers for its weekly international ZOOM meeting, we all struggle to come to terms with our current covid reality. Two of us here in New York, teachers, are scheduled for vaccines. My son in Berlin is especially confounded as the country that seemed to have it all under control and was seemingly a model response now seems to be completely at a loss as to what to do as numbers pass New York City and percentages near American levels and a new lockdown in effect.  Teachers have all but given up.

waiting for the vaccine

First day of vaccinations at Wadleigh High School across the street from me. People lined up around the block. Like the voting lines. 

Late afternoon, as the sun goes down, we walk to the Israeli cafe for coffee. There is some anxiety around the lack of ventilation in the outdoor seating area. So we don't stay long. We walk in the dark to Central Park to see if the floating tree in the Harlem Meer is still lighted. The tree is still there. But now dark.

1/19

Martin Luther King, Jr. day

Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Tonight we cancel our Bible Study because the New York City Presbytery is holding a (virtual) Rosa Parks/Martin Luther King, Jr. commemoration service. Music from a Black church in Harlem and a Korean church on Queens, A preacher from Detroit. The sharing of communion, each in our own place.  On this King day, in this year, on the cusp of the exit of a disgraced President and the inauguration of a new one, there is a special resonance to the vision of a Beloved Community. Dr.King's radical vision needs to be reclaimed from the effort to take the hard economic analysis out of his witness. He was ready to take on, to name, the predatory consuming nature of capitalism. Beyond identity politics, the progressive political constituency needs to bring the class issue back into focus in the years ahead.

1/20

Donald Trump's last day in office. We are on the verge of the change. My friend Steve comes up for coffee. We sit in the cafe's patio and review these last 4 years. Wondering how we can begin to overcome the gaps between two countries. There is a growing awareness that significant portions of our religious communities sold their souls in support of a nativist authoritarian politics. Both orthodox Judaism and evangelical Christianity have much to answer for. 

I spend three hours trying to find an appointment for a vaccination, all to no avail.

The President elect hosts a ceremony with 400 lights to commemorate the now more than 400,000 deaths from Covid. Repeat that number...400,000 fellow citizens, fellow Americans. Dead. More than World War II. The lights glow next to the reflecting pool. On into the darkness. 

Living in coronavirusworld: Holding on

 1/14

Harlem Meer

Tulsa Ice Oilers

This morning I’m wearing a hat and sweater form the 1933 Tulsa Ice Oilers hockey team. Mainly in recognition of Tulsa as a treasure house of Art Deco. Because the oil barons who built the city wanted the best and most up to  to date. Including the Boston Avenue Church, the Radio City Music Hall of churches. (For real.)

It’s hard to realize that only one week ago was the siege of the capitol. One of the collateral damage stories is of the sequestered congress people stuck together in a small room with Republicans refusing to wear masks. And now several colleagues have tested positive for Covid. It’s criminal. Like unprotected sex with undisclosed AIDS. These people should be removed from office. We are now in the 10th month of coronavirusworld. 

We speak of many things:

*the “zero vs, the infinite” as in rioters transferring “power” to Trump…they think they are superior than they know that the are not..

* Watching the siege on the capitol, we’re all called to self-examination, asking when we may have felt  the same, even acted the same. Discernment is truly important. When I say it seems to me that many there who "truly believe…,”  Steve P stops me because “true belief” is not a valid category in the conversation. “Blind faith..”is not a valid reason for action. Are there no villains, but a lot of victims? 

* Symbolic vs. instrumental values. 

* Is it about me forever, or loving your neighbors, even enemies?

Steve P thinks we need to remind those Christians who so passionately follow Trump that they have forgotten their religion, That they have entered into a space where disagreement is self-excommunication.  We debate to what extent Christian language and imagery still shapes the American narrative. Dre maintains that for many millennials, that’s over. I noted that in my experience with Occupy, even though they were militantly anti-religious, Christian imagery still filled their poetry and songs. And I also argue that there is something archetypal about the Jesus story that transcends culture. 

We all are filled with uncertainty as to what happens next.

                                                                                         ****

In reflecting on the year ahead, the leadership of New York City Presbytery must deal with the loss of over 600 members last year, including over 500 from just two “tall steeple” Manhattan churches. And currently with 87 sanctuaries, some 30 churches have no pastoral leadership. On the other hand, attendance for many of the virtual services outnumbers previous live ones.

1/15

Our Sabeel conversation focuses on Baptism. Our vows to participate in fellowship, communion and breaking bread. And to resist evil and proclaim the good news, loving neighbor and pursuing justice, and peace. Which we commit to “with God’s help.” Omar want to know if it’s more than “signs in a restaurant,” do we really take it seriously, is there Christian accountability?

I speak of the need to beyond the traditional idea of baptism as a kind of “spiritual inoculation” to keep babies out of limbo and more of a community commitment. We cannot live the Christian life without community. 

It is pointed out that in our tradition, new members are baptized as part of the Easter vigil, symbolizing that as Christians we share in Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection.

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on Harlem Meer

Walking through Central Park, I see a goose land on the wet ice of the Harlem Meer, his webbed feet skittering and wings flappier as he tries to find equilibrium. I look t tom and say, “Yeah, that’s what stating this year feels like…”

In Morningside Park, I see no life. No ducks,. No geese. No turtles. Like Holden Caulfield (in Catcher in the Rye) I wonder where they go. 

Along 118th street, anti-trump signs remain.

anti-Trumo signs

no Black vax

The ATLAH church encouraging Black people NOT to take the vaccine .”Remember Tuskegee” The evil use of black prisoners for medical research haunts us still…

a tree remains

Christmas trees remain in the parks.                                In normal years I find lingering Christmas decorations annoying, at least. Not this year. I never really felt fully embraced by Christmas this year. Just like everything seems to exist in a hazy place somewhere between virtual and real.I still feel comforted by those lights. I can hold on a little longer.