Guest post from a friend who is also a therapist, always reflecting on how we humans manage our lives. ~~~~~~~~
It continues to shock me how powerfully presuppositions and beliefs participate in directing behavior, even when contrary to all other evidence (in outcomes both for good or for ill). In this practice it seems we are all united.
I have friends in a conservative church who contracted Covid through weekly meetings in their homes. For a while they took the precaution of meeting in back yards, not indoors.
But now they've again begun to have their small home groups inside, hugging, without masks, saying that they believe God will protect them. 50% of them have already become infected. Some of these friends are hospital workers, who have the highest incidence of infection, according to statistics. Some are also vulnerable both in age and in ethnicity.
In contrast, the church my husband and I attend is in one of the first counties in California to mandate masks and voluntarily shut down, so our church has been meeting online only.
Belief is determinant.
Who but the individual can conclude the meaning of the consequences for themselves?
Compare two towns in this county:
- One is a university town, science inclined and populated mainly by rule followers. It has about 80 known cases of Covid so far.
- But a nearby town of about the same size has 300 cases at the moment. The second town is Old California and predominantly Hispanic. Extended families there have close ties and decades or even centuries of continuous residence. The virus has made greater inroads there.
I hear that if we do contract Covid-19, we are predominantly contagious 5 days prior to symptoms, especially the last 2 days.
I look around and think, "Which of the people I see, or those I know and love, is innocently sharing the virus?" The answer is unknown, both to us and to those with whom we interact, until symptoms finally appear.
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| In memory of those killed by Covid-19 |
Even the Masks don't know.
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