A Doctor's COVID19 Moorings: 'Two Vantage Points' by Fr Alberto B Paurom MD SJ

Sailing Vessels in Stormy Weather (Bateaux par grand vent) by Allart Van Everdingen

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read in an article saying that this COVID19 virus will not stop until it has “touched” everyone—to add, not just once but depending on the development of new mutants manifested as breakthrough infections, second time around, with the Delta variant. For how long will this be? I don’t know.

The first vantage point—that of the pessimists—who say this virus will not go away just like the flu. Our body or immune system adapts and as a result, by natural selection, more resistant human beings will be born. Here, we are talking about a lifetime or generation after generation. But the here-and-now presses on in frantic search for immediate solutions. Of course, the virus’s destructive capacity will not last and at some point it will simmer down. But, again, as I started in this paragraph, for how long?

What is the invitation of this pandemic? What is it telling us? No room for "Nega" here although we all would like to be "Negative" in the antigen testing or PCR.

The second vantage point to explore is a hopeful one. A break in the routine makes us pause and reflect. This is the French Philosopher Gabriel Marcel’s starting point of philosophizing. We are given this global pause to rethink and reflect where we are at this moment and where we are headed. The face mask, the social distancing and isolation into our community, home and even to ourselves have not only made us pause but also go on a kind of 'a prolonged retreat'. I wish this would lead us to connect and commune more and more with the Higher Being.

Alluding to the book of Ecclesiastes—“… a time for every purpose under heaven,” (Ecc 3:1-8)—maybe this is the time to gather, to go back home to oneself in order to grapple with the question of life’s purpose. Once we have a more personal sense of our life's purpose, then we share it with our family, with the bigger community and with the whole world.

This is what I am seeing in the horizon that, after all, Poet William Ernest Henley, in his poem "Invictus" (unconquered in Latin), is partly right and partly wrong when he penned “I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.” He is right because we have not lost entirely the capacity to do the best we can humanly, but wrong because this virus has also proven once again how we are not in control. Human hubris is once again humbled.

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gnatian Year Recollection Series: Last September 18, 2021 Fr Alberto Paurom SJ gave an online recollection entitled "Do What God Wants, And Want What God Does." He talked about navigating through the challenges on the human body and spirit using the lenses of St Ignatius of Loyola. Check out the video below: