MERS, Fear, and Selfish Faith

Twenty-One.

One Hundred Sixty-Two.

Six Thousand Five Hundred Eight.

Numbers and more numbers. It’s been around a month since the discovery of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) virus in Korea and the numbers keep climbing. The numbers keep coming. The numbers keep our fears in their place.

This concerning situation with the spread of the deadly virus has reminded us of thoughts that were buried by the ordinary routine of our lives. First, that death is real, unpredictable, and most prominently uncontrollable. Couple years back, I wrote a post on Ernest Becker’s Pulizer Prize winning book The Denial of Death. We are reminded again how Becker was right in how humanity uses everything and anything to drown out the unchangeable truth of inevitable death. Death is the ultimate problem of humanity, and yet so many live on without a hint of desire to seek out the solution. Second, fear is ok. Fear of the virus, fear of infection, fear of isolation, fear of death. Often, we jest and laugh to minimize or guise our fears. We want to look strong. Fear is a sign of weakness and weakness is oh-so-unacceptable. But perhaps, fear is not that bad. Panic is bad. But fear? A healthy dose of fear helps survival. When a wild hungry tiger comes charging toward you to make you its next menu for dinner, fear will drive you to find an escape, drive you to seek survival when charging straight on against opposition is not wise for survival. Fear can be wise. Hmmm… I think the author of Proverbs said something to that effect. Third, faith can be selfish. A week ago in the church elevator, an elder (a leader of a Presbyterian church) pulls out a mask often suggested for MERS prevention from his pocket and proclaims his faith or perhaps his humor, “I want to put this on, but I’m scared that people will think I don’t have enough faith!” My mind dashed initially towards how wrong his theology of faith was, but the more my mind ran, it saw how selfish such faith was. If strong faith means not wearing a preventative mask at the expense of contaminating other people, it is no worthy faith at all. A selfless weak faith will suffice, one that may be timid but has in sight the well-being of the other. One that says, “I don’t know how I look in this thing, maybe I will look foolish, perhaps even risk looking faithless but if it will help stop the spreading.” Fourth, family is important and they are not with you always. Speak kind words. Spend time with them. Fifth, humans think they have more control than they actually have. It is evident in light of the first point and this MERS outbreak, we have none. Control is an illusion.

Last. My thoughts go to the twenty-one. The twenty-one who had families. The twenty-one who spent their last days in quarantined isolation. The twenty-one who were not just a number to produce in us fear, but lives who had stories. Prayers to them. Prayers to their families. And a word from the late Professor Al Groves who wrote this while struggling with terminal cancer: “I am in distress. But that is not the final word in my prayer. I live on the other side of the cross and the resurrection, that toward which Nehemiah looked from a distance. For me the final word is not distress, but hope in the One who has raised me from the dead and changed me into a new creature in Christ.”