Tag: coronavirus

A Virtual Hug for Families With Children and Youth
This message is addressed to families with children and youth and those who care about them.

We have reached a point of frustration with this pandemic that is about to be compounded by the myriad of issues surrounding the opening of school. Our kids are anxious about what that is going to look like. Parents are concerned not only for their safety if they return in person, but also for the challenges raised if they participate in a virtual classroom. Either way, many parents will have to make a choice between family and employment, sooner or later.

Then, there are the people who make school happen – the teachers, counselors, administrators, cafeteria workers, custodians, bus drivers, and others without whom schools in normal conditions would simply stop working. They, too, risk exposure to the Coronavirus if the students return to the campus. What happens to a classroom of students when the teacher tests positive or a busload of students when a driver tests positive? Do they all go into quarantine at home? Who looks after them? A dozen other questions come to mind, but I’ll stop there.

Several weeks ago, St. Martin’s made the painful decision not to reopen our school. The change in student/teacher ratio, the added sanitation protocols, announcements of free public school early childhood programs in the area, no liability coverage for COVID-19-related incidents, a bleak financial outlook, along with the aforementioned questions, presented a perfect storm of obstacles. We could not see a way to open the school and safeguard the health and well-being of our kids and our teachers.

All that said, I do understand the difficult decisions public and other independent schools are facing. The decisions their leaders must make and the decisions parents and families must make are daunting. Like you, I wish I knew the right answer. But I don’t.

What I do know is this:
- The people of St. Martin's will not shame parents for whatever difficult decisions they make.
- The people of St. Martin's will stand by our parents, pray with you, and do whatever we can to help you uphold what you think is best for your children and youth.
- The people of St. Martin's will remain steadfast in offering an abundance of faith, hope, and love to parents and families.
- When this is over – and it will eventually end – the people of St. Martin's will be here for you and rejoice to see your faces reflecting the light of God’s countenance, the God who always sees us through both the bad times and the good times. Maybe that is actually the light at the end of this tunnel!
I remind you of St. Paul’s words, which we read last Sunday, in the hope that you will let them resonate in your heart and mind during this time when all these things conspire against us and seem so overwhelming:

We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose…What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us?…Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?…No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:28, 31, 35, 37-39)

May this message be a great big virtual hug for our families with children and youth. We love you!

Blessings,

The Very Reverend Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas
July 30, 2020
When Something Really Matters, We Discipline Ourselves
Public health experts have asked us to protect one another from the Coronavirus by wearing a face mask when we are out in public. Some of our fellow citizens see this as an example of some enemy trying to take away our civil liberties. They are up in arms about it. Literally. Although the data says that 84% of the population are willing to wear masks, all the sound and fury makes it appear that is the other way around.

This is an opportunity to take notice of and commend the 84% who are willing to wear masks. It is evidence that when something really matters, most of us will discipline ourselves to take care of it. For example:
- In relationships that matter, we make time for others, stay in touch, remember birthdays, give gifts.
- In work that matters, we arrive on time, do our best, take pride in the product or service, maintain loyalty.
- In regard to the environment, we conserve natural resources, refrain from polluting, use recycled materials.
- In regard to family, we show up for meals, we contribute, we encourage each other, we protect, we provide, we help each other grow physically, spiritually, and intellectually.
- In athletic competition, we wear team logos and apparel, attend games, tune in for broadcasts, cheer without restraint, and, if we're on the team, we show up for practice, train, and do our part for the team.
- In regard to our health, we maintain an exercise routine, get plenty of rest, avoid foods and other substances that are harmful, have regular checkups.
Why are we willing to discipline ourselves? Because these things matter and we are human beings. Humans have this amazing ability to take care of what's important. Christians call it "stewardship." We believe we were given this ability by our Creator in the very beginning.

It is often easy to discipline ourselves. But sometimes it is difficult. When we experience the difficulty, it is an opportunity to fully engage the gift of stewardship that other creatures do not have. Other creatures are limited mostly by instinct and conditioning. Humans are not. Humans have the ability to create something new, to act with purpose, to agree or disagree, to decide how to respond, to have complex two-way communication with each other and with the Creator. To be "only human" is to be the crowning glory of God's creation! To be "only human" is to be a member of the only race that has the vocation and privilege of stewardship.

I officiated at the funeral of a gentleman at a church I was serving as an interim. He was a top-flight accountant, churchman, family man, and community leader throughout his long life. On the way home from the cemetery, his family shared a photocopy of a card they found in his wallet. The card contained this prayer:

O Heavenly Father, who by Thy Son Jesus Christ hast taught us that all our possessions are a trust from Thee: Help me to be a faithful steward of my time, my talents, and my wealth, and gladly consecrate to Thy service all that Thou hast given me; and may I have grace to give myself to Thee. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

By this prayer, this man disciplined himself to be not just a steward, but a faithful one.

Let us take inventory of all that has been entrusted to us, especially those things that matter most. Then, let us ask God to help us be disciplined in how generously and faithfully we take care of this sacred trust. When it comes to the precautions we have been asked to take during this pandemic, my discipline protects you and your discipline protects me. It's a way to love one another and we all agree that love for one another really matters.

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas
May 28, 2020
Righteousness and Rewards

The Gospel for The Fourth Sunday in Lent this year is John 9:1-41. Jesus seems to give a non-answer to a very serious question about a blind man’s suffering.

Rabbi Harold Kushner's book, When Bad Things Happen to Good People, was a best seller. In the book, the rabbi addresses the haunting question about the correlation between sin and suffering, about righteousness and rewards. Rabbi Kushner says it all has to do with luck. There is good luck and there is bad luck – neither of which is dependent upon a person's goodness or badness. There is a kind of randomness to life.

Today, we want explanations, answers that make sense to us and reassure us that we are okay. Thousands perish of AIDS and famine in Africa, people are crushed in an earthquake in Haiti or Chile, hurricanes destroy lives and property in Puerto Rico and the British Virgin Islands, floodwaters destroy people's homes, terrorists gun down innocent people in the streets, and the Coronavirus Pandemic casts a pall of sickness, unemployment, economic calamity, and death across our planet. How can God be good and still allow bad things like these to inflict good people like us?

Jesus' own disciples asked him questions like that. “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus didn't take Rabbi Kushner's approach. In today's climate, Jesus wouldn't win any awards in the pastoral care department either. He said, “Neither. This man was born blind so that the glory of God might be revealed.” Consistently, Jesus denies any direct correlation between the kind of person you are and what happens to you. In another instance he declares that, God “makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45).

Why did this happen to me? Probably, for no good reason. Bad things happen to the good and the bad all the time. The notion that only good things happen to good people was put to rest when they crucified Jesus. Now, this same Jesus takes our question and makes it cruciform: can you trust God – in joy or in pain – to be your God? Can you love God without linking your love to the cards life deals you?

And then, we have televangelists who tell us that this pandemic is divine retribution for some views people have on various social issues. They want us to believe that if we don’t agree with their particular view of things, God will smite somebody at random and it will be our fault. That’s a pretty scary way to look at our God.

God's love carries no promises about good or bad save the promise that God will not allow anything worse to happen to you than happened to God’s own Son and that beyond sickness and death, life is changed, not ended.

Saint Augustine of Hippo mused over the great suffering that occurred when the barbarians sacked Rome. He noted in his City of God that when the barbarians raped and pillaged, Christians suffered just as much as non-Christians. Faith in Christ did not make them immune to pain and tragedy. Augustine wrote, “Christians differ from Pagans, not in the ills which befall them but in what they do with the ills that befall them.” The Christian faith does not give us a way around tragedy. It gives us a way through it!

What do we do with our neat little distinctions in a church where we think being nice is the way to salvation? God's sunshine and rain keep blurring them! This is the way God responds to our questions – not with answers that flatter us, or make the world simpler than it really is, but with God’s life given for us, that we might more fully give our lives to God.

So, during this time of anxiety, let's look for ways for God might be manifested in our lives and ways God can use us to bring peace and calm and hope to others. We don’t know how long this social distancing will last nor do we know the full impact of this health crisis. Gathering together is central to how we have always done Church but we can't do it right now. We are trying to learn and practice more and new ways to be Church when we can’t physically meet together. Worship will be streamed by video each weekend we are apart. Our clergy and pastoral care ministry are reaching out to people in the parish who are vulnerable. We are encouraging everyone to connect to our online directory (Breeze). We've set up a Helping Hands Network in order to learn who needs to receive help and who is willing to provide help. Groups are meeting via video, teleconferences, and email chains. When we need to get important information out, we will be more redundant than usual, employing a variety of avenues including social media, email, voicemail, and text messaging.

If you have put off learning how to use new technology in order to communicate with others, please, please find someone to help you learn what you need to do today! We need to see each other’s faces and hear each other’s voices. This situation is not likely to be over for months. Our faith compels and equips us to find the way through this and do it together!

Blessings,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

March 19, 2020
What Does Love Require of Us?

Yesterday, after taking counsel with the Office of the Bishop, other clergy, our staff, our Wardens, and our Vestry, I made the decision to suspend in-person worship and meetings at St. Martin’s for the next two weeks in response to the Coronavirus Pandemic. This was a complicated and difficult decision on so many levels. The question that led me at last to the decision is, “What does love require of us?”

Maybe the reason that question came to mind is because during Lent, at the beginning of our Eucharistic celebrations, we are following the long-standing practice of reciting Jesus’ summary of the Law:

Jesus said, “The first commandment is this: Hear, O Israel: The Lord your God is the only Lord. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:29-31

How will this decision express Love Divine in our parish and to our neighbors in the wider community?

The answer came clearly into focus as I read and listened to comments from those whose counsel I sought. Loving one another, and especially the most vulnerable among us, requires us to do what we can to at least slow the spread of the Coronavirus so that our healthcare system is not overloaded. It is one response we can make to nationwide calls for social distancing. Taking such steps doesn’t mean that fewer people will be infected; it means that when hospitalization and medical attention are needed there will be capacity in the system. We have only to look at the situation in Italy to see what happens when the healthcare system is overloaded.

The media are referring to this objective as “flattening the curve.” Here’s a chart that helps explain it:

We will miss seeing one another. Worship is central to our life together. But our worship includes what goes on in our lives beyond the building. For example, on Ash Wednesday, we began our Lenten fast with the reading of Isaiah 58:6-12, which reminds us that our fasts must take into consideration our care for others. The Prophet Amos reminds us that our feasts must also involve justice and righteousness (Amos 5:21-24). So, whether fasting or feasting, our worship of God leads us to loving actions for the sake of others.

I made the decision to suspend in-person worship and meetings for two weeks in light of the many vulnerable people who are members of our parish and their friends and families. Such steps may not be best for other worshiping communities. There are many ways to spread Love Divine. We’re just doing what we can in the hope that it will contribute to the well-being of those who are vulnerable.

We will be broadcasting worship on the internet and details about how to access the video link are being sent out today. We have made arrangements for our ministries to hold virtual meetings using the ZOOM video platform. We will be communicating in a variety of ways, including the use of our existing mass email program, mass text messages to those whose mobile phone numbers we have, and recorded phone messages. The parish office is not closing and will be accessible under the normal schedule.

I’ll close with some advice from Bishop Scott Mayer: “Pray for one another. Stay calm. And wash your hands.”

A Prayer for Quiet Confidence

O God of peace, who hast taught us that in returning and rest we shall be saved, in quietness and confidence shall be our strength: By the might of thy Spirit lift us, we pray thee, to thy presence, where we may be still and know that thou art God; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Book of Common Prayer, p. 832

Blessings and Health to you and yours,

The Very Rev'd Ron Pogue
Interim Rector
St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Keller, Texas

March 13, 2020