Under mass house arrest

I have seen a few troubling comments online where Christian leaders are saying that the civil government doesn’t have the right to cancel meetings of the church. They certainly don’t have the the right to do that if their objection is that you are preaching the crown rights of King Jesus. In such a case, continue to meet. But if the fire chief told all the good Christians to get out now because the roof of the sanctuary was on fire, this is something he has the right and obligation to do…Following the mandates of the civil authority on quarantines and the closing of public meetings and such during a time of epidemic is not one of them.

So to be clear, if the governor of Idaho shuts down all public meetings because of COVID-19, churches included, then Christ Church would comply. Even if it happened to be the wrong decision, or a decision with which I differed, we would still happily comply. This is one of things that is well within their realm of jurisdiction. It is their call to make. This is their job.

In ancient Israel, the authorities had the right to tear down someone’s house if it was afflicted with the creeping crud (Lev. 14:33-53). They had the right to make someone with a contagious disease into a permanent exile, having to live outside the camp (Lev. 13:45-46. This kind of thing, however unfortunate, is not a violation of anybody’s rights.

In historic Presbyterian polity (all rise!), the civil magistrate had no authority in sacred things (in sacris), but he had definite authority surrounding sacred things (circa sacra). Put simply, the magistrate has no right to tell the church what to preach, how to pray, how to administer the sacraments, who to discipline, etc. That is not their assigned task. They need to stay in their lane.

But when it comes to questions of public safety (which is exactly what this is), preachers need to stay in their lane. It would be different if we were talking about a monastery with a bunch of recluse hermit monks, and the magistrate told them they couldn’t gather in their own chapel for prayers. That would be none of the magistrate’s business. But if great herds of Baptists head out to the Golden Corral after services, and they do this during the time of an epidemic, the magistrate has full authority and obligation to tell all of them “not so fast.” This is circa sacra…There are so many areas where the church should be resisting statism, it would be shame to waste our powder on any issue where the state is acting well within its rights.

https://dougwils.com/books-and-culture/s7-engaging-the-culture/contagion-cooties-and-covid-19.html

Several problems with Wilson's analysis:

i) This isn't primarily a question of Christians standing up for their rights, as if we're only asserting our rights because we have them. Rights for the sake of rights. Rather, this is about religious rights in the service of the religious good. 

ii) There's a point of tension in Wilson's position. If he thinks this is a public safety issue, then why wait for the authorities to shut down church meetings? If it justifies social distancing and quarantines, churches should do their part by taking the initiative. If it's analogous to a building on fire, you self-evacuate the building; you don't just sit there waiting to be ordered to leave. 

iii) A problem with his example is that if you find yourself in a burning building, the risk assessment is clearcut. The cost/benefit analysis is clearcut. Everything to lose and nothing to gain by staying there. But the pandemic is far more ambiguous. The projections are uncertain. The solutions are uncertain. There are severe tradeoffs.

iv) His analysis is too compartmentalized. It's not as if the state shutting down church meetings is just a public safety issue rather than a religious issue. Take the Governor of California's list of "authorized necessary activities." That demotes public worship to a nonessential activity which requires civil authorization. Is that a principle that Christians should concede? Or is that the state co-opting our lane? 

v) There are some parallels between involuntary commitment and quarantine measures during a pandemic. The problem is the slide from unambiguous cases to ambiguous cases. Symptomatic carriers through asymptomatic carriers to the uninfected. Do you round up everybody indiscriminately and throw them into quarantine because some of them might be infected? 

It's like involuntary commitment of someone who might be dangerous to himself or others because there's a family history of mental illness, even though he himself hasn't manifested any signs of mental illness–yet. But if you wait, it might be too late. So it's safer to lock him up just in case, for the common good, even if he never suffers from mental illness. 

We're not quite at that point, and testing may help to sort things out, although we can't test 300 million Americans, and even if we could, some of them might become infected a week after they passed the test. But if politicians become desperate, don't count out preemptive measures like 28 Weeks Later. Governors have already put whole populations under mass house arrest. 

vi) Is this just a public health and safety issue? That's so this-worldly and lacking in a Godward outlook. Why do they go to church at all, even during normal times? Wilson acts like it's balancing one natural event against another natural event. Does he think the fellowship of God's people in corporate worship has no supernatural dimension that offsets what happens in the world? 

I don't mean "supernatural" in a sensational signs-and-wonders sense, but just that God blesses faithful corporate worship. Does Wilson think churchgoers are just pew warmers? Does it makes a difference, other than at the level of social psychology and emotional uplift? If the ban goes on for months, with electronic worship as the alternative, will many parishioners return if and when the ban is lifted? And why should they?  

I say this from the standpoint of faith rather than experience. It's not that I consciously experience the supernatural when I attend church. And I don't expect to since I think the supernatural usually operates at a subliminal level in public worship. My point is that if Christianity is true, then certain kinds of supernatural blessings are conditional on communal Christian experience. 

He changes not

"The only reliable comfort in the face of uncertainty" (Reagan Rose)

"Neutral bystanders"

An exchange I had on Facebook:

Mike

As to the case against Jesus Christ and the New Testament I have heard from critics that there is no reliable outside written references that would support the existence or life of Jesus Christ other than those written sources within the believing community. The claim is that trust and reliability in the New Testament and the words of Jesus Christ do not pass historical scrutiny. Putting this to the test then this claim is here stated in form of a question : Are there written references outside the scope of church writings , specifically outside writers of the believing Christian ✝ community , that validate that Jesus Christ was a historical figure ? Furthermore , can the claims of the New Testament and life of Jesus Christ solidified by asking dates of these writings fall between 60 AD to approximately 250 AD ?

In other words please provide support in the reliability of Jesus' Christ life and existence and that of the New Testament Scriptures by providing early outside ( secular ) sources between 60AD to 250AD.

Hays

There are outside sources. However, it's necessary to challenge the premise of the objection. Critics are making the contradictory demand for unbelievers who said Jesus was who he claimed to be. It's like demanding that you will only accept evidence for a murder by an eyewitness who says they saw the murder but doesn't believe it happened!

Mike

No . I would disagree with your objection. Critics are asking for testimony or references ( relatively close to the time of Jesus' historical existence ) from writers who are neutral and have no dog in the race. It's only fair , in my view , that , along with the witness and testimony of believers who have thrown all their chips in this cause , to also provide neutral testimony or outside testimony of folks " not in our club . 

Hays

"Neutral bystanders" in what sense? That they have no prior bias going in? But they can't stay neutral if they know what happened. Asking for testimony from observers who have no dog in the fight at that stage is is nonsensical. Either they know what happened or they don't. If they know what happened, then they have to take sides. At that point they have a dog in the fight.

Mike 

Still disagree with the premise of your argument. So , in the case of the New Testament - the writings of the believing community is testimony of Jesus Christ after the writers have already cast in all their lot in favor of Jesus Christ and made a decision to be in the believing community. In other words all the writings that are testimony in favor of Jesus Christ and the reliability of the New Testament are post conversion. Neutral writers / neutral references to validity of Christ Jesus are pre conversion or no conversion at all which means we have sources to testify of Jesus Christ who are on the outside " looking in."

Hays

The question at issue isn't bias but the source of bias. What makes them believers? If the evidence makes them believers, then their bias is justified. Once again, you can't be neutral if you know the facts. You could be neutral prior to conversion if you don't know the facts, but in that case you're a useless witness because you're uninformed.

"Biblical violence and moral/cultural relativism

@RandalRauser

Many Christian apologists are strident defenders of objective moral knowledge. And yet, they defend readings of biblical violence that suggest moral relativism. For example, genocide is objectively evil today but it was not objectively wrong in ancient Israel. That's a problem.

https://twitter.com/RandalRauser/status/1242423435323555840

1. Rauser says Christians should steelman the opposing position. Improve on the argument for the position you oppose, then knock it down. But Rauser routinely does the opposite when attacking evangelical theology. He picks the weakest arguments. He resorts to caricatures. 

2. One tactic is to manipulate definitions. He tries to use a rubbery definition of genocide that covers both OT holy war and modern examples. Of course, if you invent a definition that's sufficiently indiscriminate, that makes the comparison easier. But that's just verbal sleight-of-hand. 

3. The argument is not that "genocide is objectively evil today but it was not objectively wrong in ancient Israel." Sure, he quote some Christian layman somewhere who will say that, but that's the tactic of an intellectual bully. 

4. The consistent, defensible argument is what God commanded ("biblical violence") ancient Israel to do wasn't objectively wrong, and if he commanded an analogous action under analogous circumstances today, that wouldn't be objectively wrong, either. 

5. Finally, these aren't just particular "readings" of sacred text. Rather, that's what it says and what it means. Rauser understands that, which is why thinks the texts are false when they attribute such commands to God. In reality, he interprets the texts on "biblical violence" the same way his opponents do. He doesn't think the interpretation is wrong; instead, he thinks the message is wrong. If he were more honest and forthcoming, he'd admit from his perspective that the original text is morally relativistic. 

Coping with the pandemic

I was asked how Christians should cope with the pandemic. 

It's an opportunity for us to take seriously what we sing about in hymns. Life is precarious. Not something to take for granted. We should be mentally prepared for death because it comes to everyone sooner or later. What are we doing with our lives? When we look back on our lives on our deathbeds, what will we regret that we neglected? What can we do now to avoid neglecting those things? Also, meditate on the world to come.

Another way to put it, if a Christian is diagnosed with terminal cancer and given 6 months to live, what will he do with his remaining time? What will he do differently? Why wait until we're diagnosed with a terminal illness to prioritize and focus on what ultimately matters? If you were doing everything for the last time, what would you be doing?

The Implausibility and Low Explanatory Power of the Resurrection Hypothesis

I'm going to quote and comment on a long academic article attacking the Resurrection:                                                                                             

Robert Greg Cavin & Carlos A. Colombetti, "The Implausibility and Low Explanatory Power of the Resurrection Hypothesis —With a Rejoinder to Stephen T. Davis." SHERM 2/1 (2020): 37‒94.

The article is somewhat challenging to comment on because the authors are responding to a variety of Christian philosophers and apologists, viz. Craig, Davis, Plantinga et al. I don't necessarily formulate the case for miracles or the Resurrection the way they do, so in some cases I may reframe the argument. 

The authors also use abbreviations: (R=the Resurrection); (SM=the Standard Model of particle physics); (LCE=the law of conservation of energy) 

Questioning the shutdown

https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2020/03/questioning-the-shutdown

About that exponential growth curve

i) I notice commentators in social media who think the necessity of radical social distancing via lockdowns, curfews, and self-quarantine is vindicated by an "exponential" transmission rate when the pandemic spreads to a new area. The quote statistics about the daily expansion rate of infections. 

I'm no expert, but I assume the pattern is for an outbreak to initially spike, then taper off once the most susceptible members of society have been infected. It's not a continuous upward curve until everyone is infected inasmuch as individuals vary in their susceptibility to infection as well as their natural ability to recover. If so, it's not an uncontrolled pandemic but naturally plateaus. 

ii) On a related note, there's a widely expressed concern that unless radical social distancing measure are enacted and enforced (lockdowns, curfews), the elderly and immunodeficient will be disparately impacted by the pandemic. While that's a morally admirable concern and consideration, policies that lead to economic collapse will also have disastrous effects on the elderly and immunodeficient. It will lead to pension plans going belly up, retirement investments drying up, acceleration of entitlement programs like S.S., Medicare, Medicaid becoming insolvent–not to mention bankrupting hospitals. Quality medical care depends on economic prosperity. Policies that cause economic devastating are not a way to save the elderly. 

Chinese wet markets

Someone on Facebook is arguing it's "racist" to criticize Chinese wet markets. My response:

1. Culture is not equivalent to race/ethnicity. For example, look at the cultures of groups like ISIS, al-Qaeda, or the Taliban. They're predominantly a religious culture (Islam). They draw from Muslims of any race/ethnicity as long as the Muslims agree with their ideological views. Yet there's no doubt these are evil cultures. And there's nothing wrong with saying they're evil cultures.

2. True, wet markets exist in China and in America. However, the difference is we have certain food safety standards to meet, and we crack down when they violate these standards. What food safety standards exist in China?

3. What's more, China has an authoritarian government that literally could and in fact has used force in the past to crack down on its own citizens. Look at how they've used draconian measures in attempts to quash the coronavirus. If China is going to use force and even violent force against their own people, China could bring force to bear in order to enforce food safety standards or even shut down wet markets if they wished.

4. Of course, I'm not suggesting China should violently quash wet markets. Rather I'm suggesting China has the will and ability to do so, but they don't seem to do anything about wet markets. And that's likely due at least in part to the fact that wet markets are a fixture in Chinese culture. So this aspect of Chinese culture is problematic to say the least. And it's not "racist" for me to say there are problematic aspects in Chinese culture any more than it's "racist" for me to say there are problematic aspects in Muslim culture.

5. There are other people-groups with wet markets. Many Africans eat "bush meat". That's how some diseases have crossed over from animals to humans. So I wouldn't limit my criticisms to Chinese wet markets alone. I could criticize Africans for eating bush meat. How would that be "racist" if I'm criticizing the practice of eating bush meat? I'm not singling anyone out by their race.

The scope of OT holy war

Here's an exegetical article by an evangelical OT scholar who argues that the scope of the holy war passages has been traditionally misinterpreted:

https://www.godawa.com/chronicles_of_the_nephilim/Articles_By_Others/Hess%20-%20Jericho%20and%20Ai%20of%20Joshua.pdf

One may or may not agree with his conclusions, but it's carefully reasoned.

Spreading fear, intentionally or unintentionally

Is there really a plague upon us all?

Sometimes, even the best-intentioned sources can give off the wrong messages. Look at this map from the Johns Hopkins site that is tracking “Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases”.

From the look of it, it appears as if there is “a plague upon us all”. Certainly uncontrolled outbreaks of novel (new) viruses can get that way, and they have, historically, in real life, been incredibly damaging, and incredibly frightening.

But some charts and maps (like this one) aren’t helping us really to understand what’s going on, and where we are in real life.I think that the way the graphics are set up, they are more inclined to spread fear, than to explain things accurately.

It’s true that we don’t yet have all the best numbers, because not everyone’s testing is either accurate or adequate. I trust that’s a situation that is correcting itself as things move forward. In some cases, such as South Korea, we do have that kind of numbers. In other places, maybe not.

But as better information becomes distributed, we can expect that we’ll be able to see more clearly those locations where the curve is flattening, and where it is not, and the things they are doing to help things along. The video here, though it’s a few weeks old, will give you an idea of what to look for.

Exponential charts can’t work in real life.

Here’s a video that shows why that’s so, and when and how to expect and understand when things begin “flattening”.



How Exponential Growth Charts Work

Many curves are flattening (2020-03-24 -- UPDATED)

Update -- apparently there were far more new cases around than just the 2411 initially reported here. The site that I've linked to is a new site intends to keep a running total of the new cases and deaths in each state. It relies on official sources (seems like state departments of health), but unfortunately, these do not always update in the most timely way, and nor does this site update in an automated way. So the numbers are somewhat behind. From what I can tell, there were actually 13000 new cases in the last day or so, not the 2411 that were named in the original post (which I got from a source that I trust). Sorry for the confusion. Comments are closed at this point.

From this morning on Facebook: 2355 of the 2411 new Coronavirus cases Monday [in the US] were in New York. 26 of the 29 new deaths were in NY. Most states didn’t record a single new case.

HT: P. Andrew Sandlin

Source: Worldometers (scroll down for actual numbers and granular sources).

How God Operates

I’m not an expert in Old Testament. But I want to relate some thoughts from the Prophet of Isaiah, as I understand them from our Sunday School teacher, who is a Cambridge guy and head of the Old Testament department at Grove City (PCA) College here in western Pennsylvania.

The commentator Alec Motyer calls the first 2/3 (chapters 1-37) of Isaiah “The Book of the King”. My Sunday School teacher suggests it can be related as “a tale of two kings”: Ahaz and Hezekiah, who were successive kings of Judah, the Southern kingdom. Ahaz was king of Judah (the Southern Kingdom) from 735 BC to 715 BC; Hezekiah, his son, was king from 715 BC to 686 BC.

These individuals and events are confirmed by sources outside of Scripture, by the way. As Kenneth Kitchen relates in his masterful “On the Reliability of the Old Testament”:

Nature of the Sources: The sources themselves show clear affinities in the kind of records used. Ancient kingdoms (large and small) did maintain running records (daybooks, etc.), exactly as were the annals (or daybooks) of Israel and Judah that are regularly cited as references by Kings and Chronicles. … What has survived in the rest of the ancient Near East, as in Kings and Chronicles, is a series of special interest works that have drawn upon the running records… (and he lists them, pg 63, emphasis in original).

During those days, the middle east was a cauldron of anxiety, as kingdoms made war on other kingdoms, and kings made alliances based on who they thought was going to be “the winner” in the various struggles over time. Of course, all of these changed over time, and the records of these kings and their emissaries is long and complicated.

The message of Isaiah to these kings of Judah was, “who are you going to trust? Are you going to trust in foreign kings and alliances? Or are you going to trust me?”

Here is how Ahaz handled things:

Self-medicating for coronavirus

"Man dies after ingesting chloroquine in an attempt to prevent coronavirus"

Since liberals are losing their minds over this:

1. No, this is not Trump's fault. Trump did not tell the man to drink "parasite treatment for fish". This is simple stupidity. Don't be stupid. And don't blame Trump if you're stupid. If anything, Trump should honor you with a Darwin award.

2. Neither chloroquine nor hydroxychloroquine are cure or prevention for coronavirus at this stage.

3. Besides, even if it "worked", it would need to be taken under the supervision of a physician. You can't just go and do it yourself. Well, you could, but if you do, see #1.

Muhammad in the Bible? Live with Dr. Michael Brown

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ6K7K5MbWo&feature=youtu.be

Is God malevolent?

Atheist philosopher Stephen Law has been hawking this argument for years:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiufsmxiUiU

i) There's empirical evidence for angels, demons, and ghosts. 

ii) Is good the price a malevolent deity pays for evil? Why would a malevolent deity give human beings freewill? To make them morally responsible? But why would he care if humans are morally responsible? He just likes to see people suffer for his sadistic pleasure. It isn't necessary that they deserve to suffer. In fact, being evil, he'd take greater pleasure if they suffer for no good reason. If they suffer unfairly. 

iii) Law's basic argument, from what I can tell, is that the mix of good and evil in our world is equally consistent with a benevolent God or malevolent God. 

One problem with that argument is that moral good and evil are asymmetrical. It's arguable that moral good cannot exist unless it's grounded in a benevolent God. And it's arguable that moral evil can coexist with a benevolent God. 

But if that's the case, then moral good cannot exist if God is evil. By the same token, God can't be morally evil if moral evil can't exist without moral good as the standard of comparison. 

So Law's argument can't include moral good and evil. At best, he means good and evil in terms of pain and pleasure, happiness, misery, and cruelty.

v) Suppose we try to improve on his argument. Just as certain goods are contingent on certain evils, certain evils are contingent on certain goods. For instance, much suffering is the result of losing something you care about. It maybe something you used to have, or it may be a lost opportunity. Suppose we rehabilitate his argument by saying the malevolent deity gives humans experiences of happiness to make them miserable by when he deprives them of what made them happy? Does the argument go through on those terms?

A problem with that argument is that some human lives are much happier than others. In their case, the pleasant experiences greatly outweigh the unpleasant experiences. 

vi) Suppose we grant for discussion purposes that the mix of good and evil is equally consistent with the existence of a benevolent God or a malevolent God. It doesn't follow that if we can't rule out one, that rules out both candidates. Law's conclusion is fallacious. 

vii) There's also the question of why a malevolent God would take any interest in human beings. We're so inferior to him, why would he find it enjoyable to torment us? By contrast, it's not mysterious why a benevolent God would take an interest in human beings. 

Quaker Catholicism

It's fascinating to see Catholic apologists pivot on the sacraments in light of the hierarchy's response to the pandemic:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpzG8q5s0W8

Remember when Bishop Robert Barron was tearing his hair out over the fact that most American Catholics don't believe in transubstantiation? Remember how he extolled the value of Eucharistic Adoration?

Now, however, that the Catholic church has imposed an interdict in light of the pandemic, the sacraments turn out to be pretty dispensable. Overnight they've become Quaker Catholics. 

Chinese takout

Due to the pandemic, many of the businesses where I live are closed. There's isn't a mandatory lockdown. 

There's a ban on dine-in, but takeout and delivery are still permitted. In that regard, two of the Asian-American takeout joints I frequent are now closed indefinitely. I find that odd. Although they had a dine-in option, I assume that was a small part of their business. Moreover, I'd expect whatever they lose in dine-in would be offset or more than offset by increased demand for takeout at this time.

So I'm wondering if all the hysteria about the coronavirus has fomented a backlash against Asian-American restaurateurs. One joint is run by Chinese immigrants. It's not like they just got off the boat. They've been here for years, long before the virus. They didn't bring it with them. The other joint is Japanese. Maybe it's just a coincidence, or perhaps the apocalyptic scenarios have scared customers into boycotting Asian-American takeout/delivery joints. 

While the coronavirus is dangerous, there's the danger of collateral damage to the innocent by all the hype and fear-mongering. 

Is obesity a factor in coronavirus deaths?

As many know, many people are obese. Hence the question has arisen: is obesity a factor in someone dying from the coronavirus?

Yes

On the one hand, I do think obesity is a factor. Obesity alone does decrease respiratory functional capacity and it does increase oxygen consumption.

In addition, someone who is obese likely has diabetes and hyperglycemia (undiagnosed or diagnosed). The hyperglycemic state could serve as a growth medium for microbes.

And the obese are sometimes immunodepressed.

No

On the other hand, I don't think obesity is the primary or sole factor. The leading cause of death in this coronavirus is acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). However there are many obese people who have survived ARDS, heart failure, and hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH) in the context of active infection.

To be fair, modern medicine can work wonders.

Hypothesis

I suspect there might be a genetic issue involved. There have already been a number of deaths in the coronavirus due to a severe or exaggerated cytotoxic response aka cytokine storm (e.g. here, here). A cytokine storm on top of already diminished cardiorespiratory reserve in the obese.

Point being, perhaps different people's immune systems respond differently to the coronavirus. This could be a decisive factor in these deaths from coronavirus. Perhaps that's what makes a more fundamental difference in life or death at least among the obese.

Just a hypothesis. And hypotheses need to be tested.

Not just older people

The following is helpful to keep in mind, though also keep in mind the majority who are infected with the coronavirus don't need hospitalization. Of course, there are exceptions depending on certain groups. Notably health care providers are at higher risk from getting infected with, hospitalized, and even dying from the coronavirus than the general population.

While vast majority of deaths from #COVID19 are age 60+ many young adults and middle aged Americans are becoming seriously ill and surviving only after prolonged hospitalizations and ICU admissions that have long term consequences. This is a dangerous virus for most age groups. pic.twitter.com/jVYWFatTDM

— Scott Gottlieb, MD (@ScottGottliebMD) March 23, 2020

Plasma therapy for SARS-1

1. Recently there's been national news about the use of hydroxychloroquine/azithromycin as an antiviral agent against the coronavirus. For example, see my post here. In the opinion of a nobody like me, I think hydroxychloroquine/azithromycin may be promising - for example there's lots of anecdotal evidence, and there's the now-famous small study out of France - but let's not get out hopes up too much. We need more and better studies, which we can fast track. That's what I'd say anyway.

2. At the same time, I've mentioned convalescent plasma therapy more than once (e.g. this post). Here is a thorough review of the scientific literature regarding the effectiveness of convalescent plasma therapy in the first SARS virus back in 2002-2003: "The Effectiveness of Convalescent Plasma and Hyperimmune Immunoglobulin for the Treatment of Severe Acute Respiratory Infections of Viral Etiology: A Systematic Review and Exploratory Meta-analysis" (2015). It's published by The Journal of Infectious Diseases.

I presume most people likely already know our current coronavirus pandemic was started by the SARS-2 virus (i.e. SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19). But I mention it just in case some don't.

3. Likewise Arturo Casadevall at Johns Hopkins is starting a grassroots organization called the COVID-19 convalescent plasma project.

4. Of course, these aren't mutually exclusive. We can pursue both as well as other viable means to combat the coronavirus (e.g. remdesivir). In fact, we already are pursuing many other viable means to combat the coronavirus (e.g. see this Science article). Ultimately the best solution would be a vaccine. But at this point it looks like a vaccine is at least a year away if not much longer. So we need something in the interim.

Praying with the sick

Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord (Jas 5:14).

How society responds to the pandemic is going to be the dominant issue for however long, and it's an issue with many practical repercussions, including Christian fellowship, so at the risk of belaboring the issue, here's another consideration: 

For many Christians, the pandemic raises two concerns: how to minimize becoming infected, and how to minimize infecting others. There's an altruistic rationale for suspending church services: we don't want to infect other parishioners, and due to the incubation period of the coronavirus, you can unwittingly infect someone as if you're an asymptomatic carrier. So Christians have a duty to practical social distancing for the sake of others, during the pandemic. So goes the argument. 

I'd add that these are interrelated. Even if your primary concern is not to protect yourself from infection but to avoid infecting others, yet if you become infected, that makes you a carrier, so there's a vicious cycle. 

That's well-intentioned, and up to a point it has some merit, but however laudable the motive, is it a Christian duty? Compare that to the passage from Jas 5:14.

One of the convenient things about prayer is that you can pray at a safe distance. You don't have to be present with the individual you pray for, and in some cases it isn't possible to be with them. 

Yet despite that, in James 5:14 it's not sufficient that the elders pray for the sick. They are obliged to pray with the sick or pray over the sick. Go to the Christian on his sickbed. Indeed, make direct physical contact with the sick by anointing their skin with oil. The polar opposite of social distancing.

If you think about it, that's naturally hazardous at several levels:

i) The elders run the risk of contracting a contagious illness from the sick Christian. 

ii) That, in turn, makes them carriers. When they return home, they may infect their family and servants. 

iii) In addition, infection was far more perilous in the 1C, which didn't have our pharmaceuticals.

iv) Finally, they risk infecting the sick Christian. Due to illness, his immune system is already weakened, which makes him more vulnerable if an elder has a communicable disease. And I daresay that in the 1C, many people suffered from chronic diseases. Not all of them were communicable, but given the primitive state of medicine, they had less knowledge that we do to draw that distinction. 

Of course, James 5:14-15 is a command to Christian elders, and not to Christians in general. But it does establish a principle. 

Praying for protection

Atheists read the bible!

@AtheistsRead

Isn't it a little arrogant to pray for protection from a virus God created? Either God wants you to die or not. Who are we to question God's actions? We couldn't possibly understand his mysterious ways.

https://twitter.com/AtheistsRead/status/1241872142733643781

It's funny how atheists think comments like this are so insightful and clever and intelligent and devastating, as though they've got the Christians cornered. As if this is such a humdinger for Christians. 

i) How God answers the prayer by or for someone mortally ill is, in itself, an indication of whether he wants them to live or die.

ii) One of the purposes of suffering is to inspire prayer. 

iii) Regarding a phenomenon on the scale of a pandemic, there's no reason to think God has one and the same intentions for everyone impacted by the phenomenon. 

Are we in agreement that prayer doesn't work?

Expanding on a reply I left on Facebook:

Has anyone tried asking God to end the Coronavirus or are we all agreeing that prayer doesn't work?

That's a simplistic approach to prayer. 

i) Whether or not a prayer-answering God exists isn't determined by unanswered prayer but by answered prayer. To seize on a particular example of unanswered prayer is arbitrarily restrictive, as if God granting that petition is the only salient evidence for a prayer-answering God. 

ii) A pandemic is, by definition, a complex event, in this case becoming fairly global in scale. So it's not as if there's only one kind of prayer for God to answer in that situation. The fact that God doesn't prevent or halt the pandemic in toto doesn't mean God hasn't answered many prayers involving particular instances of the pandemic.

The pandemic impacts many people in many different ways, so I don't expect an undifferentiated response from God. Rather, I expect God's response to prayer about the pandemic to be varied and individualized. 

iii) In a cause/effect world, just about every event has a domino effect, the more so with large-scale events like the pandemic. Evils like the pandemic can also be a source of good. Some goods things will happen as a result of the pandemic that wouldn't happen if God prevented it. So it's a question of balancing the tradeoffs. Mitigating the pandemic in some respects without eliminating the beneficial side-effects.

Chickenpox

@DrMichaelLBrown

When your little girl has chickenpox, do you bring her to the children's church on Sunday and say, "I have faith that none of the other children will be affected," or do you keep her home? I think you get the point.

https://twitter.com/DrMichaelLBrown/status/1241473584083673088

Yeah, I get the point. 

i) The problem lies not with the hypothetical example but the implied comparison. Brown uses an example that no reasonable Christian can take issue with.

The problem is not the example but what he's using it to illustrate. A more accurate analogy would be canceling all church services because a parishioner might by asymptomatically infected with chickenpox. Brown's illustration loses all plausibility when you spell out the parallel situation.

ii) Surely the irony is not lost on some readers that Brown is one of the world's most prominent charismatics, and he's not a charlatan, unlike many high-profile charismatics. But given his charismatic theology, it doesn't seems unreasonable to say "I have faith that none of the other children will be affected."

Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin redux

....be put in use IMMEDIATELY. PEOPLE ARE DYING, MOVE FAST, and GOD BLESS EVERYONE! @US_FDA @SteveFDA @CDCgov @DHSgov

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 21, 2020

1. I've recently discussed hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin here.

2. That said, the following 7-minute video says exactly what I've been trying to say but far more clearly, succinctly, and perhaps even objectively (I admit I can get carried away in debate). It's non-partisan and focused on the medical science. His conclusion is like mine: it's promising, but (thus far) based on limited evidence.

Corporate prayer

Corporate prayer and public worship wind back through Christianity to OT worship. The Psalms are corporate prayers, performed in corporate worship. 

Are there any distinctive supernatural blessings indexed to public worship? Is the risk of contracting the coronavirus offset by any supernatural blessings indexed to public worship?

Does it ultimately make any difference whether or not you go to church? Are there certain kinds of blessings that God reserves when Christians pray and worship in fellowship?

Likewise, is there anything supernatural that ever results from public worship? Or is public worship at best a neutral experience, hanging in a balance, but the scales are easily tipped against it if a natural risk factor is added? 

Prayer meetings

Here's a thought-experiment: should churches hold prayer meetings about the pandemic? The prayers would focus on two things:

i) Pray for folks they know who've contracted the illness

ii) Pray that God will mitigate the pandemic

Parishioners at higher risk (elderly, immunocompromised) would be excluded from attending the prayer meeting for their own protection.

1. There's the possibility of contracting infection at the prayer meeting.

2. There's the possibility that God will grant some of the prayer requests. Petitions he wouldn't grant if they hadn't been offered in corporate prayer. 

3. There's the possibility that God will decline to answer their prayers.

How should a Christian balance these considerations or "risk factors"? Should we take the position that it's too risky to give God the opportunity to answer petitionary prayers regarding the pandemic at a prayer meeting?

Even if someone contracts the illness at the prayer meeting, or even if God declines to answer the prayers, it still honors God to hold prayer meetings and practice corporate prayer. So we can still expect God to bless Christians who honor him, even if the blessings are ancillary to the prayer request. Or can we?

Are we duty-bound to forego prayer-meetings where we come together pray for a crisis because it's too risky to seek divine intervention for that situation in that setting? Is the paradox that the worse the situation, the less reason to seek God in corporate prayer? We should only turn to God in corporate prayer when we're safe? 

Sick churchgoers

During the pandemic, suppose two things happen:

i) A Christian goes to church

ii) The same Christian develops the coronavirus

Is the presumption that he got sick by going to church? Or is that the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy?

Consider some other activities the Christian may have engaged in that week:

• Went to the supermarket

• Went to the drug store

• Got takeout from a Chinese joint

• Got delivery pizza

• Spoke face-to-face with some residents in his apartment complex or condo complex

• Checked in on an elderly neighbor to see how they were doing

• Walked his dog, in the course of which he got into a conversation with someone else walking their dog

• Self-quarantined with his wife and three kids

The list could be easily extended. Each of these encounters is a potential transmission vector. He might contract the virus from the pizza delivery boy, or the cashier at the drug store or Chinese takeout joint, or from shoppers at the supermarket, or the elderly neighbor he checked in on, or a family members, and so on and so forth.

So why do critics single out church attendance as the default culprit? What if that's sheer coincidence, given a multiplicity of transmission vectors? Rationally, you could only pin it on church attendance by ruling out all the other transmission vectors. Are critics in a position to work through that process of elimination? Or is singling out church a reflexive indication of their bigotry?

Teach us to number our days

Lord, you have been our dwelling place

    in all generations.

2 Before the mountains were brought forth,

    or ever you had formed the earth and the world,

    from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

3 You return man to dust

    and say, “Return, O children of man!”

4 For a thousand years in your sight

    are but as yesterday when it is past,

    or as a watch in the night.

5 You sweep them away as with a flood; they are like a dream,

    like grass that is renewed in the morning:

6 in the morning it flourishes and is renewed;

    in the evening it fades and withers.

7 For we are brought to an end by your anger;

    by your wrath we are dismayed.

8 You have set our iniquities before you,

    our secret sins in the light of your presence.

9 For all our days pass away under your wrath;

    we bring our years to an end like a sigh.

10 The years of our life are seventy,

    or even by reason of strength eighty;

yet their span is but toil and trouble;

    they are soon gone, and we fly away.

11 Who considers the power of your anger,

    and your wrath according to the fear of you?

12 So teach us to number our days

    that we may get a heart of wisdom.

13 Return, O Lord! How long?

    Have pity on your servants!

14 Satisfy us in the morning with your steadfast love,

    that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.

15 Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us,

    and for as many years as we have seen evil.

16 Let your work be shown to your servants,

    and your glorious power to their children.

17 Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us,

    and establish the work of our hands upon us;

    yes, establish the work of our hands!

(Ps 90)

Not surprisingly, politicians and the secular media have been obsessed with preparations to survive the coronavirus. And we should make reasonable preparations, although there are many conflicting projections and policies about how to contain it. 

What's more striking is the reaction for the church. For instance, the entire Anglican Communion has folded like a bad hand of cards in the face of the pandemic:

https://virtueonline.org/anglican-communion-shuts-down-over-coronavirus-pandemic-updated

Likewise, flagship evangelical churches hav suspended public worship. For instance:

https://www.fpcphila.org/covid-19

A question this raises is what message we're sending to believers and unbelievers alike. One message is that there's no overriding good in attending church at this time. Church is a hazard to be avoided.

Then there's the message we're not sending. While the world is making desperate preparations to survive, the church should be preparing believers and unbelievers alike on how to die. Not because death from the pandemic is inevitable or even likely for most folks. But sooner or later, death comes to one and all, young or old. 

Is that the message we're sending? Are we preparing people for death? Are we preparing believers to face death? Are we preparing unbelievers to face death, and make necessary changes before it's too late for them?

Where's the Christian witness of the church in this time of crisis? The world retreats behind locked doors and the church retreats behind locked doors. Who can tell the difference? 

My late Aunt Grace was a missionary in Kenya for 13 years One time her husband shot a black mamba on the front porch. Not only did he have to mop the porch after that, but he had to get down on his hands and knees to scrub it so that natives wouldn't be envenomated by residual poison seeping into cuts in their bare feet.

Theirs wasn't a ministry for the risk-averse. Theirs wasn't a ministry for Christians who play it safe. 

Adopting classical/evidentialist arguments

An issue in apologetic methodology is whether it's consistent for a presuppositionalist to adopt arguments from classical or evidential apologetics. That depends in part on whether we define presuppositionalism as an apologetic methodology that only deploys transcendental arguments. I think that's an unduly narrow. One role of presuppositionalism is to take advantage of what had been a neglected type of argument for theism: transcendental arguments. But that doesn't mean other types of arguments should be excluded.

One issue is whether criteria are worldview dependent or worldview independent. Classical and evidential apologists accuse presuppositionalists of vicious circularity. Classical and evidential apologists try to isolate and identify a set of general criteria that can be used to evaluate any competing worldview. 

If, however, there's only one God and one reality, then ultimately our criteria derive from that reality. Criteria must match reality. At that level, criteria are bound to a particular worldview–the true worldview.

A Christian apologist can't just play the rules of the atheist (or Buddhist). Those may be arbitrarily restrictive and slanted. Sometimes a Christian must challenge the criteria of the atheist. Or explain that his criteria require a more robust worldview that's at odds with naturalism and physicalism. It isn't necessarily possible for Christians and atheists to arrive at a common set of rules. 

This also goes to the question of how much is riding on God's existence. In addition to contingent facts, presuppositionalists think logic, mathematical truths, moral realism, and possible worlds are grounded in God's existence. If so, our criteria can't be independent of God's existence because they derive from God's existence. (According to natural law theory, there's a sense in which moral realism is a contingent fact, based on God's design for human creatures.)

However, that's viciously circular only if there's no way to demonstrate the claim. If, though, it's possible to formulate arguments which demonstrate that logic, morality, modality, and math require God's existence, then it's not viciously circular. By process of elimination we rule out naturalistic explanations. But that's philosophically demanding, painstaking process. A work in progress. 

It's consistent for a presuppositionalist to adopt arguments from classical and evidential apologetics so long as we acknowledge that those are worldview dependent.  

Is the flu deadlier than the coronavirus?

I think there's an equivocation about which is deadlier. It may be less deadly in terms of the death toll, but deadlier in terms of the virulence of the pathogen. Of course, it's too soon to know the cumulative death toll. So the comparison people are making fails to distinguish between different ways of defining "deadly". A Taipan is deadlier than a Timber rattlesnake in terms of toxicity, but if you live in W. Virginia, you're unlikely to be bitten by a Taipan.

Tame the trajectory

We've been told to "flatten the curve" because it'll prevent hospitals from becoming inundated with too many people at one time.

What about "flattening the curve" for supermarkets? After all, I'm sure most of us have seen all the panic-buying, empty shelves, and absurd fights breaking out over nothing by now.

If everyone didn't panic-buy all the toilet paper, hand sanitizer, pasta, and other non-perishables all at one time, then maybe grocery stores could better handle the flood of sales.