How Should Catholics Respond to the Coronavirus Pandemic?

how many's father Mike Smits and this is essentially since we are living in crazy times this is the special coronavirus edition quarantine edition [Music] okay little story last week the university that I work at was on spring break and so I had the chance to lead about 38 of our students including some students from other colleges to Israel to the Holy Land on a pilgrimage gosh we was we were so excited but before we took off we knew that the coronavirus had at least one case I think it was one case in Israel Israel and so it was like well how do we go do we not go whose gamble right and so every one of our pilgrims had the opportunity to say no to say like you know I know I've been planning on this but saving up for this but I have to admit I'm not gonna go they all said they wanted to go so we went well we landed in Israel and that very day Israel declared that the borders would be more or less closed to everyone incoming that upcoming Thursday and this was Sunday this up when we Thursday unless you were a citizen or unless you were willing to be quarantined for 14 days and so we thought oh my gosh what are we gonna do if there aren't any flights coming in that there probably won't be any flights going out oh my gosh will our plane even be able to take off and go back to the states and like I don't know we don't know so immediately like our tour company started like sprung into action tried to get tickets for us and so we meanwhile we're doing a pilgrimage we're doing our trip right we got three days we had basically a long weekend in the Holy Land because late I think it must have been Tuesday night like 12:30 in the morning Tuesday couldn't say you know I got it's knock on my door it was like hey you have to be downstairs in the lobby in ten minutes because there's a shuttle to the airport you have to be on a plane a couple hours and that was it I mean I was the trip was done it like walkin from a deep sleep to like racing to the airport to get to catch this flight took a flight from Tel Aviv to Istanbul waited there for a few hours took the longest flight of my life from Istanbul to Los Angeles and then waited there for a couple days because not all of our group got to leave at the same time we were divided up into three different rupes because they couldn't get a block of seats on a flight for 38 people at the same time and then finally was coming coming to get back to Minnesota we flew from LA to Chicago from Chicago to Minneapolis and then drove from Minneapolis to up to Duluth here where I live in the middle then I got here I think at like 2:30 3 o'clock in the morning it was so interesting because the whole time it was like well should we get on the plane or should we risk it should we gamble and like you know maybe our flight will take off because here's what happened that afternoon the originally scheduled flight from Tel to Washington DC that I was gonna take to get back to the States took off as scheduled which one looks like oh my god I'm so glad actually I'm really grateful that I didn't have to be the one to make the calls right I didn't have any responsibility I had no like decision-making power whatsoever it was all to the tour company all up to the group that was kind of sponsoring us I was just the chaplain I was there to say okay I'll help along the way whatever you choose I will do what I can I will do it I can that's it but it's easy at the on the ground is easy to say why are they doing this you know why are they giving these flights why what are we waiting till the end of the thing because it's it's so easy in the midst of this whole coronavirus stuff in the midst of what hears that the government is doing here's what the bishops are set are saying it is so stinkin easy for us to be armchair quarterbacks like it's so easy for us to be Monday morning critics right today because what do we have we have the luxury of being able to criticize we have the luxury of being critics because whatever they do whatever the bishops decide whatever the government you know that with declaring that you know restaurants shouldn't be serving with declaring that you know gyms aren't open places of public gathering more than ten or twenty five or twenty fifty people whatever the thing is can't can't happen like it's easy for us to sit back and say that's an overreaction like it's easy for us to be critics we have the luxury of being critics because we don't have the responsibility of having to make a decision and again I've heard so many people criticize the bishops who are saying you know we're not gonna have masses but publicly the saying they're being cowardly like well I don't know or other bishops who are like having we're having more masses that they're being foolish like I don't I don't know that they are I'm not sure that the bishops who are just heating the recommendations of like you know biologists are being cowardly I think they're being wise I don't know if the bishops who are saying we're having more prayer and more masses are being foolish maybe they're relying on the Lord I think that it would be wise maybe just not even charitable but like wise for us to say okay I'm gonna do two things I want to be grateful that I don't have the responsibility of making the decision because I don't know what I would choose because it's not just my life right I mean you're a bishop it's not just your life it's not just this handful of people it's every soul in your diocese you're having to make a decision about and yes you might survive something like this but what if you made a decision that even cost the life of one person that would be that be a hard responsibility to have and so maybe safe than sorry right so be grateful and secondly you pray for them like intercede on their behalf and not only on their behalf this is this is the thing with all of this like in and having quarantine and having like restricted lives our sphere of interest is like massive right like I want to know I want to know why the bishops saying this why the government say this or who's doing what our spirit of interest is massive but he we have to understand our sphere of interest almost always outstrips vastly outstrips our sphere of influence there our sphere of interest what what I want to know about what I want to weigh in on what I want to criticize sometimes even vastly outstrips far outstrips my sphere of influence like what I actually can do right now in this kind of a situation what can i what can I do not just what can I criticize what can I do not just how I can complain or point out where someone else has done something wrong or what I disagree with what can I do what is my sphere of influence and maybe all I can do is I can wash my hands and I can pray maybe that's all I can do but maybe what I can do is I can wash my hands and I can pray and I can reach out to that person who lives down the street but even giving him a phone call or even just kind of stopping by after that I can have social distancing I can you know we can we can level out the of the curve right at the same time like how about to paying attention to our sphere of influence rather than living in this place of sphere of interest because there's people in your life there's people in my life right now that I actually can be in contact with like I can be in contact with them through the phone I'm in contact with them through FaceTime or Skype or or even maybe even in person who knows why don't want to do that it's a luxury to be able to be a critic and it is a massive responsibility to have make a decision three things one is I want it like make a note quick of like how serious this is it what I mean by that is I know that illness is a real thing and I know that some people you already were listening or watching this you already have people maybe you've gotten sick maybe someone you love has already died maybe you've lost someone that's massively important I know with the stuff about like restaurants closing and other kind of small businesses are being massively incredibly affected they that's your livelihood you're in the service industry like so affected if you work in hospitals or in clinics and just like having to go to work and saying like what am i doing in this moment I'm exposing my my friends and my family because I have to go to work I have to take care of people just please know that what I can do is I can pray for you and I am praying for you because that's that's a big deal that's a big deal it's really some people it's like it's a little kind of a break kind of a little adventure others is how am I gonna pay my bills now how am I making how can I make sure that my family is safe and I completely understand that I get that not to worry not to give in to fear but to lean forward to move ahead second thing is some people ask the question of like is this is this as a part of God's like punishment is this is this because we're being faithless you know we're a faithless nation or a faithless world pay those people is this is this God's divine judgment and I would say I don't know if I would say this I say that whenever something likes what happened in the Old Testament the people would take that as a sign of they need to repent so whether this is a divine judgment or not it's not mine to figure out whether this is an opportunity to repent and change my life and come back to the Lord that that is this is that that is what this is you know make sense and last thing is is this is is I know people are saying but how can I live without the Eucharist you don't have to live it off the Eucharist we have they don't have public masses anywhere in my diocese they already canceled those things in my dice he's like okay I that we painful that would be painful but I don't know if they have they closed the doors of your church like you can go visit the Blessed Sacrament right maybe you can't in which case I understand sometimes we'll do this to drive over to the church park there it's tested outside it's got the gutters big tabernacle that could be opportunity you know the universal that the prayer of the church is called the Liturgy of the hours and the prayer that that every priest promises to pray every single day is not the mass although it's good for every priest to pray the masses at least once a day the prayer that we promise to pray is the Liturgy of the hours morning prayer daytime prayer evening prayer night prayer and then with the thing called the office of readings you say I don't know how to do that or not get to the store and buy this expensive book of how to pray all these prayers you don't have to go to your App Store and get go to I bri-bri i BR e VI a ry I bravery it's my favorite I briefly has all the prayers in there and when you pray them you're uniting yourself you're uniting your prayers with the prayer of the church because that's the liturgy ours is the prayer of the church in all of this there's no need for fear there's no need for anxiety there's no need to a criticism what we need is we need gratitude we need to intercede you need to do what we can now we can we need to pay attention to our sphere of influence not just our sphere of interest and we can pray we can always pray even if church doors are closed we have full access to the father's heart in Jesus Christ our Lord so pray be grateful and cover your mouth when you cough for almost zero sense presents my name is Paulo Mike god bless [Music]

Channel: Ascension Presents

Views: 319,500

Rating: 4.9124885 out of 5

Keywords: coronavirus 2020, COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, coronavirus, Israel pilgrimage, flatten the curve, #flattenthecurve, sphere of interest vs. sphere of influence, count your blessings, Fr. Mike on the coronavirus, Fr. Mike Schmitz, Ascension Presents, Ascension, Ascension Press, my corona, lent 2020, lent and the coronavirus, coronavirus lent, response to coronavirus, catholic coronavirus, cancelled masses, coronavirus no mass, coronavirus quarantine, covid 19 usa, coronavirus punishment

Id: RTP5P9PtYwA

Length: 10min 52sec (652 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 18 2020