John J. Metzler (jjmcolumn@earthlink.net) is a United Nations correspondent covering diplomatic and defense issues.
Coronavirus shrouds Easter
By John J. Metzler
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The coronavirus outbreak has closed down the world, at least as we know it. From the Far East into Europe and North America shutdowns, lockdowns, and stay-at-home orders are the norm. And for good reason, COVID-19 could be the most dangerous global pandemic since the 1918 Spanish flu scourge which killed millions.
This is not a test, the pandemic is tragically all too real. Holy Week is upon us and both the rituals and rites and joyful religiosity of the Easter season are strangely absent save for the peeps and some chocolate bunnies in the supermarkets.
Church services are banned. Palm Sunday and Easter, the holiest and most hopeful days of the Christian calendar, can't be publicly celebrated since gatherings are forbidden.
Worshipers are also unable to go out and celebrate Passover and its ancient message of freedom. Yet this is not the order of some dystopian alien dictatorship which seized our world while we were watching Netflix, but rather the sober realization of policymakers that we had better not fool around with COVID-19.
Clearly the atmosphere remains surreal in our cities, schools and stores. So from the U.S. to South America, Australia, South Africa and India, we are closed.
Wuhan, China, where the deadly virus started to spread last December, faces a sociopolitical purgatory which still continues despite the happy talk by Beijing claiming that the health emergency is largely solved.
China's lack of transparency has deepened and obscured the overall crisis. Beijing's mendacious regime may still face its “Chernobyl Moment” when the full truth emerges! And it most certainly will.
Western Europe remains the epicenter of the deadly virus with Italy, Spain and France facing the largest mass casualty events since World War II. Britain and Germany are not too far behind. France has used draconian police powers to keep people off the streets, to protect them from this unseen enemy.
Even senior citizens need permission passes to take walks during the day! Usually vibrant cities such as Paris are ghost towns, bathed in beautiful spring days!
Just a year ago during Holy Week, Notre Dame Cathedral, the iconic Gothic masterpiece which has graced Paris for nearly a millennium, suffered a terrible fire; the heart of France was ripped but her soul has yet more to endure from further calamities with the pandemic.
The U.S. now too confronts a frightful onslaught of the coronavirus, with the virus sweeping major urban centers such as New York and New Orleans. New York has become an eerie place.
Again the jarring changes come not from atheistic regimes but from the cold hard dictate of “The scientists” who in the name of our salvation, are vigorously guarding our health. These experts are being followed with near theological rigor.
Indeed Netflix has become the new deacon and holds our attention with droning vespers of vivid entertainment and mini-series. While I will refrain from saying hooray for Hollywood, let's be happy that given this sports-free spring there is some entertainment.
The U.S. economy which stood powerfully at its bright zenith has now been eclipsed by Planet Corona. As publisher Steve Forbes suggested on FOX, the economy has been put into an induced coma, stopping for a time before its revival. But it must be revived soon.
The loss of more than nine million jobs, through no fault of the companies or the workers, remains a grim consequence of the governments' and governors' health shutdowns. People are hurting and want to get back to work. Small businesses and farmers deserve a chance. Health care workers, doctors, truckers and food store staff deserve a shout out!
New York's Timothy Cardinal Dolan in a special message to Christians and Jews in the New York Post underscored that as a country, a state and especially “for us as a city, are 'passing over' from contagion, fear, infection, isolation and suffering, to unity, healing, recovery and a renewed life.” Cardinal Dolan added that both the message of Passover and Easter underscored the point of salvation.
Now like a wartime president Donald Trump has marshaled a public-private sector initiative and coordination not seen in the U.S. since WWII. What used to be rightly called “the Arsenal of Democracy” during WWII, will become the engine of American revival and renewal in our times.
But it's now spring! Easter is a time of rebirth and reawakening, for our societies worldwide and for our battered economies. Trump stressed, “We have to open our country again!” This is certain. We eagerly await the green light to get going again!
John J. Metzler (
jjmcolumn@earthlink.net
) is a United Nations correspondent covering diplomatic and defense issues. He is the author of “Divided Dynamism ― The Diplomacy of Separated Nations; Germany, Korea, China.”