This afternoon in the city of Tampa Mayor Jane Castor plans to issue a “stay-at-home” order in response to the growing incidences of virus cases locally and statewide. We were not the first to issue such an order nor will we be the last.
In its own way, it is as though each family is being sent into exile away from so much of they know as familiar: work, recreation, grandkids, grandparents, gathering places where community is formed, church, and more. Consider a week during the “old normal” and list out all the places you went but now can no longer go. Perhaps that is a glimpse into a limited exile. Continue reading
I suspect that in the coming days more and more metropolitan areas and perhaps states will issue directives to stay at home. They are many monikers for this, but isolation will do. In the days ahead, lots of people will share experience, experts will offer advice, pop-up “experts” will hold forth with all manner of guidance, and I think we are on the cusp of a new cottage industry. The thought of 30 days isolation is daunting, no doubt. 
What a difference a day makes. Wednesday, I woke up with a full day of ministry awaiting. Lots of people calling, emailing – all asking “Are we going to shut down? Will the Bishop suspend Masses? What’s going to happen now?” Today I awake wondering what I will do with all the time on my hands. Not that there aren’t a lot of things to do, but the rhythm of the day is changed. Changed dramatically. What a difference a day makes.
13 Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to share the inheritance with me.”14 He replied to him, “Friend, who appointed me as your judge and arbitrator?”15 Then he said to the crowd, “Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one’s life does not consist of possessions.”16 Then he told them a parable. “There was a rich man whose land produced a bountiful harvest.17 He asked himself, ‘What shall I do, for I do not have space to store my harvest?’18 And he said, ‘This is what I shall do: I shall tear down my barns and build larger ones. There I shall store all my grain and other goods19 and I shall say to myself, “Now as for you, you have so many good things stored up for many years, rest, eat, drink, be merry!”20 But God said to him, ‘You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?’21 Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God.” (Luke 12:13-21) 
friarmusings 