Dea
r St. John's Community,
This morning my family and I went to the Tidal Basin to see the cherry blossoms at sunrise, keeping a safe distance from the relatively thin crowd of others. It was a gloomy morning, but unforgettable.
We were there for the blossoms, but we happened upon a place that we'd never experienced before--the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Monument.
I was struck by the statue of hungry but dignified people standing in line for bread, and of the man leaning close to hear the voice of his president on the radio. I shared with my daughter that Roosevelt is the one who said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
It was a reminder of what the American people are capable of when we come together, and of what good leadership looks like. As hard a challenge as we are facing with coronavirus, Roosevelt led us through undeniably harder challenges. (It is well known at St. John's that in 1933, during the height of the Great Depression, he asked to have a private prayer service in our sanctuary on the morning of his inauguration, knowing that for him the more prayer the better!)
Historian Jon Meacham noted in the
Post
this weekend that FDR knew the value of pointing people to the facts. During the daunting early years of WWII he said, "Your government has unmistakable confidence in your ability to hear the worst, without flinching or losing heart." In that same period he said words that I believe are fitting for this very moment, "The news is going to get worse and worse before it begins to get better."
We need leadership that puts truth above party or self regard. Truth saves lives, and we should settle for nothing less.
While Americans are broken into epistemological bubbles--so much so that too many don't trust experts, or history, or even science itself--this mode has not always been the way we have functioned.
The good news is that like cherry blossoms, which are fleeting, things change. I pray that before long we will be able to agree on what is truth again. Many are correctly pointing out today that you cannot gaslight a pandemic.
Some right now still do not believe this disease is more than a "hoax" because that's what they were told very recently. Although, thankfully, they are being told otherwise now, the updated perspective is slow to set in, and tragically it is all but certain that some of those people will in fact die as a result. It is a hard truth, but many are noting
that what we learn from this may actually cause us to better handle worse challenges ahead, like climate change.
It is never too late to turn to what is true, and to spread the truth, like sunlight. I love William Sloane Coffin's theological phrase about what it means to live the Christian life, that it is defined as "living the truth in a world of illusion."
Spiritually and temporally, truth will set us free.
***
Worship tomorrow.
You may tune in at 7:45, 9:00 or 11:00, or any other time you like. The service will go live early tomorrow morning. There will be music, prayer and preaching, including a choral anthem. The duration is about 25 minutes. Please join us!
