Tuesday, October 6, 2020
After the spike in confirmed Covid-19 cases last week, the number has dropped again but hospitalizations are seeing a slight increase. We really don’t want another lockdown so we must keep up our guard. But keeping up our guard does not mean neglecting the many serious issues we face as a community and as a Nation.
There’s no question that the recession from the virus has been different from the other recessions of the last thirty years. The poor and marginalized always suffer more in a recession, hovering just below persons in the higher 50 percent of earnings group. But in this virus recession, they did not just dip but plummeted.
Remote work favors the college-educated with as many as 6 in 10 persons working remotely but for those with only a high school education as few as 1 in 7. And remote learning for students has impacted the poor even more since many parents must stay home with their children, especially younger ones. As a people who follow the One who reached out to all, we must reach out and find ways of providing the assistance those most impacted need at this time. To do less belies our faith.
Prayer for the Day
We see and hear numbers, O God, but often they have little meaning
For we do not see the parents and children facing economic loss;
We read of families unable to pay their rent and are left wondering
Where they go and what will happen to their children.
Move us beyond concern into action to help those in our Nation
Who are most impacted by the social virus of poverty.
In the name of him who reached out to those most marginalized,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
The Bible insists that the best test of a nation’s righteousness is how it treats the poorest and most vulnerable in its midst.
Jim Wallis, Christian activist, founder of Sojourners magazine
There must exist a paradigm, a practical model for social change that includes an understanding of ways to transform consciousness that are connected to ways to transform structures.
bell hooks, American poet and social critic
I know that the Lord maintains the cause for the needy,
and executes justice for the poor.
Psalm 140:12