The way we are collectively reacting to the virus is product of the “there is no God, so I will be God” mentality. People just can’t process the simple fact that the waves of the infection are determined not by human actions but by seasonality. We are cognitively incapable of acknowledging that there are parts of reality that we can’t control.
And it’s in everything, not just the COVID response.
Global warming. We need to do something!
Low math scores in schools. We need to do something!
Puberty is unpleasant. We need to do something! Of course, the “doing of something” is always moralistic.
Clarissa's Blog 
Adam and Eve’s biggest offense against God?
Mainly Hubris, more than anything.
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“there is no God, so I will be God”
I don’t get it either. I have no capacity for religious faith but I have no problem at all realizing and coming to terms with the fact that large parts of reality are mostly beyond human control.
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This is related to “Yes, Minister” logic:
We must do something!
X is something!
We must do X!
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I’ll add onto that…if one doesn’t go along with the prescribed response, one is blamed/shamed. The same way we blame lung-cancer patients for their cancer and fat people for getting diabetes. We like to blame/shame people. Unless our specific vice is on display. Then, we don’t like when people blame/shame us.
My mom is in the hospital with Covid-pneumonia. I’m shocked at how many people are blaming her for not wearing a mask. Even though she wore the stupid mask where required. My sister got Covid and was sick for a month and she wore the mask every day for her medical assistant job. She was the first one to say my mom got sick “because she refused to wear a mask.” But when my sister got sick last summer it was all, “I don’t understand why I got sick? I wore the mask. I’m so angry. I must have forgotten to hand-sanitize between patients.”
I’m not that smart, but even I can see blaming/shaming people isn’t going to stop anyone from getting sick. Zinc is very effective at stopping the virus. We took it when we were exposed and got sick. We recovered nicely. But my relatives keep harping on the masks.
When my mom went to the hospital I told my dad, “It’s in God’s hands. We can trust that His plan is perfect. We don’t have to fear death. That is the whole point of Jesus death and resurrection: death is dead! If we believe in Him, we will have eternal life. But to your point – the disbelief in God has us feeling very afraid and willing to try anything to evade death–even to trusting masks and experimental gene therapy to evade the one thing no one can escape: death.
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I am sorry your mom is in hospital, I pray she recovers quickly and will be able to get back home soon.
It is irrational to blame people for getting sick. Even if you believe that all the mitigation efforts (masking, lockdowns, distancing, vaccination) do what they are supposed to do, no one has ever promised that they completely eliminate the possibility of catching the virus.
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Thank you so much. I appreciate your kindness.
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I’m also hoping for the best for your mother. Stay strong.
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Margaret, I hope your church is offering you solace, during this difficult time. It is never easy to have a loved one in the hospital.
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Best of luck to your mom!! I’m sorry she’s sick and I pray she gets better!
My friend died of lung cancer at the age of 52. Whenever I mentioned this, the only question was, “did she smoke?” She didn’t but who cares? Did she deserve to die if she had?
Any illness, any mishap can be traced back to something a person did at some point in life. So what? Let’s now respond to anybody who is suffering with the list of what they might have done differently in their lives?
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So I dared to say these things to my boss yesterday and he said I was wrong; people do bear the health consequences of their bad choices (not wearing a mask/overeating and getting diabetes). I can’t really argue with my boss–he’s always right. We’ve had disagreements before–but this caused me to lose any and all respect for him. 14 years as his assistant. He can suck an egg. The decline started years ago when he told me I would be wealthy if I only “worked harder”. He’s a multi-millionaire getting ready to retire early. I don’t begrudge him his money; he’s earned it. But to be so horrid as to say such things when my mom is so ill is just ignorant and rude.
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