Post 8/2025 Cornwall UK. This is my second of three posts looking at our experience away from home in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. We were in Carbis Bay, County Cornwall, UK when the March orders of the day all revolved around the novel coronavirus. Normal life shuttered to a stop.

Before moving back five years, here’s a taste of this week. We had good walks, visited with friends, viewed the special exhibit at the Penlee House Gallery in Penzance, and wouldn’t you know it, returned to Becks Fish and Chips for dinner, a 15-minute walk away.

Penlee House Gallery

Children’s art work is currently on display next to works of artists in the permanent collection. Blessed are those, young and old, who think, breath, and act to care for air, land and sea for all living things.

Photos from walks

Across time and space (2020 blog)

(I’m sorry I was unable to retrieve photos that were part or this blog. Statistics from the World Health Organization show that the cumulative total of world Covid-19 deaths to February 23, 2025, number 7.1 million Total for the US was 1,161,164; UK 232,000; Canada 55,300).

Cogitation 13 Saturday 28 March 2020. Individuals, families, communities and nations around the world are faced with battling Covid-19. We look for answers, relief, reprieve. We look for physical, emotional and spiritual healing. My spirit was lifted this week in hearing our friend Ellen Kraybill playing and singing online a hymn whose refrain is, “Healer of our every ill, / light of each tomorrow, / give us peace beyond our fear, / and hope beyond our sorrow.” Written by Marty Haugen, a prolific liturgical composer, the hymn sails across time and space.

We lit a candle on Mothering Sunday (22 March) at 7 pm, in an action promoted by the Church of England to remember all involved in the nation’s Health Services, “as a sign of solidarity and hope in the light of Christ that can never be extinguished.”

My thoughts go to a refrain from an African-American spiritual: “There is a balm in Gilead / to make the wounded whole, / there is a balm in Gilead / to heal the sin-sick soul.” And this assurance in the final stanza, “but then the Holy Spirit revives my soul again.”

From Wikipedia I learn that “Balm of Gilead was a rare perfume used medicinally, that was mentioned in the Bible, and named for the region of Gilead, where it was produced. The expression stems from William Tyndale’s language in the King James Bible of 1611, and has come to signify a universal cure in figurative speech.”

Balm: anything that comforts or soothes, yes. Temporal solutions, yes. Inward inspiration of the powers of physical, emotional and spiritual healing, yes. Outward reach in thoughts, prayers and acts of compassion with others in need, yes.

For me, with Easter looming, I claim Jesus as my “balm of Gilead,” the Jesus who took on human suffering in death, was resurrected and reigns through the church. We’ve been deeply encouraged by the online messages from religious leaders, family and friends, as by the heroic efforts of front-line workers battling Covid-19.

On Thursday at 8 pm we joined a host of Britons who opened their doors or windows to Clap For Carers. A spokesperson for the organizers said, “during these unprecedented times they need to know we are grateful.” Some landmarks, such as the Royal Albert Hall, were lit-up in blue during the salute. We heard applause from next door and behind the hedges across the street. Truly, a moment of solidarity offered to the National Health Service and other carers all across the UK.

A plea from the NHS for volunteers to join up to call people, deliver medications, and help with many other support services, was met with overwhelming response; more than 500,000 people volunteered in 24 hours and many more since. Also, villages have organized to reach out to elderly and others via delivery services, phone calls, leaflets placed in mail slots and online listing of whom they can call as needs arise.

May the balm of Gilead, in literal sense and figurative speech, convey our longing for “a universal cure.”

We have tickets in hand to return to the US a little more than a week from now. We pray for travel safety, including that transport and connections stay intact. Likewise we pray for others returning to their homes from around the world. A niece wrote: “We will pray you home.”

There are constant reminders around us of God’s love and care for humankind, the crown of God’s creation.

Across time and space, may we gain and give comfort and “peace beyond our fear.” May the growing communal spirit prosper and endure.

Peace, grace, love and renewed hope.

-John

Executive orders

I struggle to come to terms with what’s currently happening week to week in national and world affairs. For instance, the volume of executive orders coming out of the White House has been compared to a blizzard. In a real blizzard a community rallies with extra effort to take care of everyone and everything. Sadly, the Republican Administration appears to be lost in a blizzard, doing the opposite of taking care of everyone and everything.

Lord have mercy. Thank you for the many who are acting on behalf of everyone and everything, for the jobless, the ill, the displaced, the downtrodden, the refugees, those without hope, those doing well, for all living things. I pray with gratitude for religious leaders, civic leaders, and children and parents, friends and families, and others who are embracing and acting forthrightly for a better future for all. And yes, thank you for political leaders who are fulfilling their oath of office. I’m sometimes at a loss, Lord, at how to think and pray and act for those fomenting a blizzard. Help me to know how to pray for those who appear to pursue malefaction over benefaction. Thank you for giving me occasion to smile, laugh, and extend the peace. Thank you for hearing me. Amen

-John