Each weekday, Father James Lyons (Wellington) will be helping us reflect on God’s Word while we are in lockdown. What is God saying to us as we globally unite to defeat Covid-19?
CONTAGION
SETTING: photos or names of people, places, situations that have influenced you for good.
Prayer:
It’s getting hard, Lord, living in a bubble.
I want to burst through it, to touch and to hold
and to live in the closeness I’m used to
instead of this closed-in existence.
But I know the danger, the ease with which I
can contract Coronavirus and pass it on.
Strengthen me to do what is right:
to stay at home, to keep my distance,
to respect this most contagious invader
and to pray and work for its defeat.
Amen.
CONTAGION – it’s from the Latin, contagion, meaning contact or touching. While the world awaits an antidote to Coronavirus, Covid-19, we’re advised the best approach is frequent washing of hands, keeping two metres apart from others when speaking, walking or shopping, and avoiding physical contact with people, objects, animals or anything outside of our personal “bubble”.
This prayer time invites reflection on your attitude to the present situation and the restrictions being placed on your personal freedom. But also, and especially, to consider contagion in its widest sense – what the dictionary calls “a spreading social evil, a corrupting influence”.
SCRIPTURE – Matthew 15:1-20 – Read and Meditate
Jesus notes the cultural concern for cleanliness as a way of avoiding disease (not unlike the present insistence about hand washing, etc.), but broadens the discussion, pointing out that a greater contagion can come from within a person. We each have within us the ability to destroy the mind, the heart, the reputation of others – something far worse that a physical illness.
It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles. [Matthew 15:11] and [vs 18]:
What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles.
REFLECT
- What speaks to you through this scripture about your own ability to “defile”?
- Can you identify anything in your own behaviour, attitude, outlook, conversation, that might be “contagious”, in the sense of being a “corrupting influence”?
Contagion refers not only to negative influence. On the positive side:
There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious than laughter and good humour – Charles Dickens
It was the way you laughed… I knew I wanted that in my life – R M Drake
A smile is contagious – be a carrier!
We all smile in the same language!
Smiling is infectious
You catch it like the flu
When someone smiled at me today
I started smiling too
I passed around the corner
And someone saw my grin
When he smiled I realised
I’d passed it on to him
I thought about that smile
Then I realised its worth
A single smile, just like mine
Could travel round the earth
So if you feel a smile begin
Don’t leave it undetected
Let’s start an epidemic quick
And get the world infected.
[Spike Milligan]
——–
A smile lights up the darkest day and outshines the stars at night
Smiles calm the fears of little ones and put their tears to flight
A smile will take you unaware for there’s nothing quite as bright.
SCRIPTURE – Ephesians 4:29-32
Let your words be for the improvement of others, as occasion offers, and do good to your listeners… Never have grudges against others, or lose your temper, or raise your voice to anybody, or call each other names, or allow any sort of spitefulness. Be friends with one another, and kind, forgiving each other as readily as God forgave you in Christ.
St Paul is concerned that the “new life” given in baptism is fully developed. It is this life – life in Christ – that draws the baptised into the lives of others, their needs, their concerns, and draws away from selfishness. Reflecting on Paul’s instruction (above), in what ways do you see these good behaviours and attitudes becoming “infectious” or “contagious”?
INTERCESSIONS – to a caring God
For those working to halt the spread of Coronavirus and beat the contagion that is causing death, grief and great loss throughout the world…. [R]
In your love and care, protect and guide us.
For scientists and others trying to develop an antidote to defeat this new and grave threat to humanity…. [R]
For the safety and protection of doctors, nurses and all medical staff, placing themselves in danger as they treat the infected and seriously ill…. [R]
For all worried and fearful in this time of uncertainty…. [R]
For our world and the nations of people: may whatever influence we have be used for the good health of earth and one another, only for good…. [R]
Visit us [Anne Powell]
In breath of wind
In endurance of cliffs
In glow of kowhai
In silence of stars
In solitude of moon
In eyes of the poor
In embrace of a mother
In pleasure of friends
In faith that does justice
