A reflection by the Junior Warden
COVID changed just about everything, and yet the exigencies of life go on just the same as before.
As most of you know, in addition to being your Junior Warden, I lead our Partners in Care ministry, a pastoral outreach that helps people in the Memorial community understand and manage their health, especially in the event of serious illness. So when I think about what COVID has changed, I think about how it has changed our access to and use of the health care system.
To be sure, our health care providers have responded heroically to the emergence of COVID-19. We have a number of them in our congregation, and I hope you’ve noticed their names on our parish prayer list, a link to which is included in each week’s email announcement of on-line worship services. Please join us in praying for their safety, and for God’s grace to guide their healing work.
It often feels like COVID has taken over the entire health universe. Yet, we still need health care for other reasons. People still get other illnesses. People still get older, and parts of our bodies wear out. Chronic illnesses still need to be managed. Accidents happen. Vaccines come due. The list of reasons to seek medical attention during this time of isolation is as long as it ever was. Yet some people are reluctant to go to a health care provider’s office or a clinic, fearing that doing so could bring exposure to the virus that causes COVID-19.
I hope no one reading this is delaying needed medical care out of concern that health care settings are unsafe, because doing so could have serious consequences. Delayed care often makes conditions harder to treat. If you have a concern about your health for which you would ordinarily seek care, it is best to reach out to your provider and discuss your options. Doctor’s offices and clinics are taking many precautions, including spacing appointments further apart to limit the number of people simultaneously in the clinic, requiring masks and social distancing, meticulous surface disinfection, and, often, telemedicine as an option. Rather than deciding on your own to delay care, please let the decision about whether and when to seek care be a joint one between you and your provider.
Even though Partners in Care cannot, in the age of COVID, be as hands-on as it used to be, we are still available to address concerns, and help think things through. We can still find ways to support you in communicating with your provider, and in carrying out your mutually agreed upon plan of care. We can still help keep you connected to care. We can still help you understand what providers tell you. A phone call, text or email to me, Fr. Grey, or the church office is all it takes to start a conversation with a member of the Partners in Care team.
Memorial has always been a place where people look out for one another. Partners in Care emerged from that tradition. But Partners in Care nurses are hardly the only ones in our congregation who provide support to help keep us all well. I hear about it all the time. A family is moving, and parishioners step up to provide meals, childcare, and sweat equity to help get the job done. Someone returns from the hospital, and folks run errands, take meals, or provide transportation. An older parishioner is showing signs of strain while trying to remain at home, and a team of folks emerges to keep a watchful eye and lend a hand. Often, there’s no formal committee at the root of these actions, just loving hearts with action on their minds.
The bedrock upon which these actions are laid is the fact that God has called us into a community of faith.
Jesus said, “Love one another as I have loved you.” Out of our shared love and devotion of God, we come together to worship. Out of worshipping together in love and devotion, we come to love one another. Out of our love for one another, we respond when there is need. The economy of God’s love is limitless. It transcends the worldly – even a pandemic. It leads us to be God’s instruments in providing for one another’s needs.
I am so grateful to be part of a community of faith that lives the Word as this one does. Especially now.
As Fr. Grey says: Stay safe. Stay church.
