Grieve with Hope

Almost two months later, we are still on lock down, with extended safer-at-home orders set to last through the end of May. The fear (what else can I call it?) that has gripped nearly every corner of the world is awesome to witness, somewhat baffling to take in. When, in the history of the world, has most of its healthy inhabitants been quarantined?

In the beginning of March, data and research convinced us all to stay home so we could flatten the curve and not overwhelm the medical system? We complied. And our lives changed forever.

Now the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel keeps moving farther and farther away as government leaders and policy makers shift the mission to saving as many lives as possible. We are still shuttered at home, even though data and research unfold daily with varying interpretations that don’t clearly seem to support these ever-extending stay-at-home orders.

Is anyone else perplexed why the mainstream media narrative presents basically the same stories day after day? Every day we are given account of new confirmed cases and deaths, the number of test kits and PPEs, everywhere. Why doesn’t the narrative regularly highlight, or even include, the daily number of cases recovered? Wouldn’t we want access to fair and balanced information that covers all facets of what’s happening?

These are the questions nagging at the corners of my mind and heart as I try to move forward every day with my family, folding laundry, sorting items, packing up our home for a relocation.

Why do we not hear more from the mainstream narrative about the “collateral” damage and lives lost as a result of our shattered economy? Lives lost in suicide as jobs disappear, businesses fail, futures evaporate. Do these lives not matter as much as COVID 19 death?

Why don’t we hear about the small children around the world who aren’t able to get vaccinations (that already exist for decades!) because planes can’t fly and organizations aren’t sure how to function? How will the world manage smallpox and measles outbreaks? How many kids will die as this concern gets kicked to the curb in the lock down?

In the U.S. we do have our poor people too (a group that is growing as the economy ruptures and bleeds out), but is it anything like the starving poor migrant workers in India and across Asia, or those in swaths of Africa (where, by the way, enormous swarms of locusts ate up their crops, so no food)? What happens to the aid that usually comes from the more prosperous West that is now completely shattered financially and in lock down? How many will die worldwide as a result of our policies?

I listened to a friend talk about her dog’s emergency health crisis recently and their trip to the vet where she was offered an MRI and other expensive tests with the likelihood of scheduling surgery. I wondered why a breast cancer survivor who has a recalled implant (because it’s now linked to causing other cancers!) had to cancel her surgery in April. Why a diabetic man died on his doorstep holding hospital discharge papers. Why do I know people living in chronic and severe pain who can’t get treatment (one doctor has 30-some patients on a list for hernia surgery) because all medical focus is on COVID 19? Why are doctors and nurses being laid off and clinics and hospitals experiencing financial collapse?

Initially, this was meant for two weeks to flatten the curve and not overwhelm the medical system. Haven’t we accomplished that? But we still sit. At home. Non-essential (including medical) businesses closed.

The response to those protesting that restrictions should be alleviated cannot be “lives matter more than money always.” This comes across as a stubborn, shove-my-fingers-in-my-ears-I-will-not-listen-to-you response that says all the lives lost as a result of this lock down do not matter. In truth, lives without money cease to exist, in other words death.

Again, staying at home to flatten the curve and not overwhelm the medical system seemed logical. To demand the wealthy or the government bail us out – give us their hard-earned cash or just print more money – is not logical. People want to go to work. People can work. And who in the end will pay back the rich and the government? My parents taught me money doesn’t grow on trees and so I never expected anyone just to give me some.

In a country of 1.353 billion people, India has 35,000 confirmed cases (as of Friday, 4/24/2020) with 1,152 deaths, while 140 million migrant works are walking to their home villages (or stuck somewhere on the way) in 90-plus degree Fahrenheit temps without any promise of future income (check out more about this finding articles online). What is the life-saving measure here? What does the mainstream narrative teach us about the value of individual lives?

Never before in the history of humankind has fear driven us like this – promoted by a worldwide narrative. As an American living abroad, I often felt thankful for our unique freedoms and rights “back home,” which compelled me to try and contribute in a meaningful way wherever I was in the world. The disappointment in watching my country collapse in on itself now is gut-wrenching. I know, it sounds dramatic, but there’s just no other words I can find for it.

As the reality of that settles in and takes up residence, something else becomes quite clear, laid bare as every other expectation or hope is stripped away: I have put my hope in the wrong place. Hope in my government or fellow humans for the right response for a better tomorrow, for science or experts or government leaders to find answers and make right decisions – hope placed here will always fail.

People all over the world find hope living under oppressive governments without the freedoms and rights we’ve enjoyed for so long in America. But hope can’t hang on the blessings I’ve experienced in the past. Hope isn’t hope if it dies with your grief. For hope to exist it must be above and beyond and in the midst of these present difficulties.

So stripped bare of untruth, I do not grieve as someone who has no hope. While my gut is wrenched to watch it happen, hope beats with life.

There once was a man who became a follower of Christ – in a truly blinding light – back in the first century – and he went on to help build the Christian church in spite of much hardship and persecution. He said: “That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and won’t last…. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.” (the apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, NLT)