Hi everyone.
New to posting.. and wanted to thank Alex particularly.. and Mathew and Dario and Jenni and all ... for entertainment during these awesome times. The frequent heated discussions prompted me to send the following Thought for the Day .. John Bell from Iona Community has kindly given me permission to post it to you. Hope you have the patience to read it all !
"I have always been attracted to prophetic figures.. whether they be ancient like Isaiah or contemporary like Martin Luther King or Nelson Mandela.
If you look at the content of what they had to say, you can discern three strands : they analyse the present predicament.. they offer empathy and solace to the despairing.. they re-imagine the future.
At the moment we have quite a lot of analysis. Indeed we may be suffering from analysis paralysis. And there has been good support and encouragement for many from people close to us and from programmes on the media.
But what about re-imagining the future ? There's a growing clamour to be told when the lockdown is going to be eased. But what will the post-lockdown future hold ? Or what should it hold ? No politician ever imagined they would have to deal with a post-pandemic world. Much in their past manifestos is now redundant.. so what next ?
Some people just want to get back to normal. I desperately hope that we don't. That would mean essential workers, particularly in private care homes, returning to underpaid oblivion. It would mean business, transport and industry re-contributing to high levels of pollution. It would mean a return to underfunded health and social services, with experts only listened to in times of crisis, rather than to prevent crises. It would mean a devaluing of the importance of the arts and of open spaces as essential for public well-being.
There's a moment in the history of the Jewish exodus when, wearied by travelling and uncertain of what was to come, the recently liberated slaves complain to God that they want to go back to Egypt. It was a case of mental myopia ; they forgot that the past was not at all pleasant. So God declined their request and instead let them wander about aimlessly for forty years until they were open to embrace a very different future.
Maybe some of the things we are experiencing at the moment hold clues to the new normal we might aspire to .. time to talk at length rather than in soundbites, the enjoyment of showing consideration for others, neighbourhoods taking initiatives, ecology as a partner rather than the servant of economics, and an awareness of how, unless we help the poor of the world to get through this time, the virus might return to us with a vengeance. Such things are not for political manifestos to determine ... but for us ALL to discuss and discover."
Perhaps this should have been posted under Boris or Brexit discussion topics ? Please take care and stay safe.. and be grateful you are still alive. From Tony in Snowdonia.