[Fuusmchat] Fw: The Pandemic is a War to be Fought -- consider a different metaphor

Thu Apr 23 18:48:57 CDT 2020

From: Meg A. Riley, Church of the Larger Fellowship 
Sent: Thursday, April 23, 2020 2:49 PM
To: marthamcg at suddenlink.net 
Subject: The Pandemic is a War to be Fought

      Meg writes about meaning making in times of tragedy. 

                                "The metaphor being used now most commonly by people of all political affiliations to describe the current pandemic is war." 

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                                Dear Friends,

                                I have been thinking about the 1917-18 flu more these past six weeks than I ever did in my life.  One of the things that has baffled me is why the elders in my family—ceaseless storytellers about the Civil War, both world wars, the depression, and so many other pieces of history that they brought to life for me —never talked about it.  I had actually never even heard of it in a way that made me think it mattered, before.

                                My friend Sharon Welch, who reads All The Books and tells me about them, told me she’s reading a book about that flu lately, called Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World (Public Affairs: 2017).  She is reading it because of the subtitle, How it Changed the World.  She tells me that this flu changed led both to fascism in Spain and worldwide attention to Gandhi’s revolution in India, not to mention the creation of public health and all kinds of things.  

                                But what she said that most caught my attention—because I am a meaning maker, and I know how important story and metaphor are in creating meaning—is that the reason we never heard about this pandemic which so radically affected the world is that there was really no story line created for it.  No common meaning made, so people didn’t talk about it.  If my family is typical, they certainly didn’t!  My granny was 20 when it took place, and though she told me a lot about World War I, she never mentioned it at all. 

                                The metaphor being used now most commonly by people of all political affiliations to describe the current pandemic is war.  The pandemic is a war to be fought.  Our bodies need to fight the disease.  Many authors have written about the negative public policy which falls out when war is the dominant metaphor, and we have already seen authoritarian power grabs globally using this ‘war’ as rationale.  

                                But war is also not a helpful metaphor medically, at least so far as I understand how COVID works.  As I get it, the reason kids get the disease so much less is that while they have great innate immune systems which prevent it from entering the body, those immune systems don’t fight with the disease; they simply assert a boundary. No thanks, they say, not here.  But once COVID does enter, from people with less robust innate immune capacity,  the immune system causes what's known as a "cytokine storm". “Cytokines are a group of proteins that send signals to cells in the immune system, helping direct the response.  A cytokine storm is a catastrophic overreaction that causes so much inflammation and organ damage, it can be fatal.”  (that’s from a blog by a scientist; cytokine storms are yet one more thing I never heard of until recently)

                                As we make meaning of this and talk to one another about it, finding metaphors which lead to justice and care is a challenge. I’d love to hear if you have found helpful language.  

                                One person who is inspiring me almost daily with metaphor and descriptor of this time is CLF Minister Lynn Ungar.  If you haven’t  given yourself the gift of following her writing, I encourage you to go to her website, www.LynnUngar.com, and read all that she has written while staying home. 

                                Warmly,

                                Meg

                                P.S. We have felt so honored to minister to all of you in a time of crisis. The Church of the Larger Fellowship is powered by the generosity of individual donors, please consider making a gift to our Crisis Fund at www.clfuu.org/give.  

                                Meg A. Riley
                                Senior Minister 

                                clfuu.org 

                                questformeaning.org 

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