Today the Covid 19 virus is raging, tearing through our cities, spreading fear and changing everything about how we go about the business of living. It has robbed us of physical and financial security and isolated us from each other.

Today also the virus of anger is raging, tearing through our cities, spreading fear and forcing us all to grapple with the ugliness of human nature. It has robbed us of the illusion that we can legislate and regulate away an evil that resides in the human heart.

We are all desperate for solutions that will end the sickness so that we don’t have to think about our mortality; and end the violence so that we don’t have to examine our prejudices.

Sociologists can theorize, legislators can debate and people can argue on social media, but our only hope boils down to this: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind,” Jesus said, “This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:37-39)

When love of God overcomes our fear of death and love of our neighbor overcomes our prejudice, only then do we have anything of substance to offer this broken world.