-
concerning the recent report from the Catholic Church
Luke 10:
But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side.
“A priest … passed by on the other side.”
-
“Roman Catholicism does not readily distinguish between public and private moral obligations”, and yet Roman Catholic institutions have worked to be exempt from this integration of the Chuch and State spheres. The institutions aim for “the exemption solution”: Catholic hospitals argue their First Ammendment rights free them from, e.g., performing or discussing abortions, and so on. Liz B sees two simultaneous outcomes:
There are those who worry that the exemption solution won’t work forever, and those who worry that it will work too well, shrinking the role of religion in public life and reducing the ranks of the faithful. There are also those, like me (I should note that I, too, am Catholic), who suspect that both may happen at once: that religions whose ethics conflict with the broader culture will shift toward forming small, dense enclaves, where they are unlikely to encounter legal challenges to their preferred practices.
-
Liz Bruenig: “It’s just that the Catholic right is no longer recognizably Catholic. Its politics are more or less identical to those of the other members of the right-wing Christian coalition.”
-
a wide, barren, featureless liberty
Which is to say that [Biden] is an ordinary Democrat — more or less his explicit pitch. Perhaps Catholics have earned the right to no distinction, the privilege of blending seamlessly into the social and political landscape of the United States, the freedom of having no special moral obligations. And what a wide, barren, featureless liberty it is.
An “American Catholic” or a “Catholic who lives in America”?
-
keep it real, Bonnie
Our local B.C. hero, Bonnie Henry, even has a “Good Times Guide.” Part of the “public health PR clinic” that she’s put on: a graphics team to bring us the trendy Bonnie. If us damn kids won’t listen to the buttoned-up Bonnie behind the podium, maybe we’ll listen to this chic version.
-
Natural antibodies?
Emily Chung, Christine Birak, Marcy Cuttler, cbc.ca:
A closer look at people who tested positive for COVID-19 but never developed symptoms has found that such asymptomatic carriers have few to no detectable antibodies just weeks after infection, suggesting they may not develop lasting immunity.
There’s growing evidence that a significant proportion of people who test positive for COVID-19 never show symptoms, although it’s not clear what percentage of people that is and what role they play in spreading the disease.
I don’t recall precisely, but it seems to me that the conversation was not as much “well, herd immunity is a bad idea because we might not get immunity” but more so “herd immunity is assumed to work (we’ll get to immunity), but that will sacrifice too many lives.” But this report makes me think that the former question would have been the right one. Natural immunity may not even be on the table.
-
Bonnie H isn't fussing
Bonnie Henry, B.C.’s much-loved leader on COVID, on the letter from 230 scientists to the WHO:
‘I actually think it’s a little bit of a tempest in a teapot in that we all agree on the extremes and we’re fussing a little bit about how much we need to focus on the bits in the middle,’ Henry said during Monday’s COVID-19 briefing.
Scientific acumen with even a dose of wisdom. A rare bird. Willing to see the forest and not the tress in this recent conversation (though I have no opinion on who is right here).
The contrast between the rhetoric of Henry versus that of (federal) U.S. leaders is striking. I saw that she’s recently been highlighted in the New York Times for her role in B.C.’s response to COVID. I wonder whether any U.S. regional health leaders have the respect that Henry does here. The few friends I talk to seem to indicate not.
(As a U.S. expat, I continue to pray for the U.S. and implore myself to maintain a sense of compassion for the difficult situation many of y’all find yourselves in—as we sit relatively comfortably here in Canada. Hang in there, friends!)
subscribe via RSS