Optional Memorial of Saint Jane Frances de Chantal

Lectionary: 415

Pass through the city, through Jerusalem,
and mark a “Tau” on the foreheads of those who moan and groan over all the abominations that are practiced within it. 

To the others I heard the LORD say: Pass through the city after him and strike! Do not look on them with pity nor show any mercy! 

Old men, youths and maidens, women and children–wipe them out!

Today’s passage from the Prophet Ezekiel sounds dreadfully familiar; he describes a plague. It is merciless and arbitrary; it wipes out “old men, youths and maidens, women and children” without distinction of race, class, wealth, learning, or merit. Only those marked with the mysterious tau -- a Greek letter similar to our Arabic T -- are exempt, those who moan and groan over the crimes of Jerusalem. 

Ezekiel tells us that God’s elect are not helpless in the face of an epidemic. They know what to do; they practice make atonement for their sins and the sins of their fellow citizens. (Many of us wear the tau each year on Ash Wednesday.) 

Christians practice penance first by owning and admitting our sins. We dare not pretend to be better than others; if we are exempt it is solely by God’s choice. Even our willingness to repent is a fruit of the Spirit which God has given to us.

Acts of penance include an eager willingness to work with others to alleviate suffering. Confronted with Covid-19 we know what to do. A simple, effective method has been tested and proven: wear a facemask whenever we’re in the company of other people, indoors and out. They are cheap, plentiful, and available. We also maintain high standards of cleanliness; which, as every Christian knows, is next to godliness.

And we pray, “Spare your people, O Lord.” We have been given the Christ-like responsibility to pray for and work for our fellow creatures on this earth. We are the “soul” of the Earth; a guiding, spiritual presence which gives direction and purpose to the God’s creative enterprise. The Letter to Ephesians describes our purpose:

God has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ, in accord with the favor of his will, for the praise of the glory of his grace that he granted us in the beloved.

If many of our contemporaries do not take the Word of God seriously, if even a pandemic leaves them unpersuaded and unrepentent, we hear the word and keep it. And our presence makes a difference.