Approaching Wrong

 Sometimes during hard times in life, when we are not absolutely overcome by stress, we get to grow a little in our soul. Hardship seems to naturally bring reflection--the very beginnings of it are seen in the common exclamation "Why me? How could this happen?"--and once we get over the self-pity, we can delve into true introspection, and begin an honest examination of our essence.

Which is how I arrived at questioning whether I valued flesh over spirit, i.e. mankind's health or his redemption.

I am very passionate about promoting health literacy and preventing disease [This may have come from my nursing career, or it may have caused my nursing career, or it may be that I don't want to be in charge of healing the entire world so let's get everyone's self-actualization going.], and boy have I had a lot to work with (or rather, work against) in this SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. I'm posting medical articles, giving [mostly]-solicited advice, and commenting with [the known] truth to the fallible thoughts of friends and family [I could, of course, reply to all of the misled social media posts, but that might be seen as trolling and probably would be ineffective]. I really, really want people to take the contagion of COVID19 seriously, because it can be sneaky, disabling, and fatal. I saw it in the hospital, and I see evidence of it in the news.

Those are all very temporal problems, though: problems of being mortal. And while I was reading a religious commentary, I began to worry I was focusing on the wrong thing. Shouldn't I be passionate about others' spiritual, rather than physical, well-being? Share the Good News? And just let the temporal things be? 

In fact, some religious persons believe that the best way to prepare for the Lord's triumphant return is to allow wars to rage, famines to spread, and wickedness to reign--concluding that such disasters hasten the Second Coming. Interfaith violence in the Holy Land? Sure, let's help it along; if the world falls, Armageddon will come faster! What a self-fulfilling prophecy! 

I thought, and read, and discussed, and came to a decision. I am not of the opinion that I need to allow the world go to hell in order to faster reach heaven, that I or any good persons have the responsibility to punish people outside of or beyond civil law. I have the ability to improve lives--at least for a season--and I count that as doing good. 

It is not my job to sit back and do nothing, thereby letting people build a case of how wrong they are, signing their own punishment and condemnation. Such damning evidence should not be passively noted--as if marking how far on the Wickedness Growth Chart an individual is--without offering any mitigation, any protest, any medicine. I may not (and probably can't) change people in the wrong, but I still have a duty to help those who have been wronged. And those who are ill. And those who will become ill due to others' actions. 

Because life is important, because I show my faith by my deeds, because this is my sphere of knowledge and influence, and because I cannot imagine true religion to be unethical.