Covid-19 vs. Christian Science - there can be only one winner!

Saturday, 28^th March 2020

 The things I do, for you my loyal readers… I know more than I would like about the voting record of Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, more than enough about Pierce Brosnan’s sartorial beach choices, and now, on your behalf, far too much about how the Christian Science community are going to survive this pandemic with prayer.

It pains me, slightly, to admit, but this morning I watched all 12 minutes and 31 seconds of Michelle Nanouse’s Christian Science video, on their website, entitled ‘Finding your immunity from disease.’

Michelle explains that, “Jesus’ practice included healing. It also included spiritual defence from contagion.” Well, I am familiar with the Bible passages where Jesus heals the sick but I’m a bit fuzzy on the bit where he laid his hand on a heathen’s head and said, ‘Go forth, Covid-19, and leave this man in peace.’

Michelle quotes Mary Baker Eddy, founder of Christian Science, in her talk to the congregation: “Many a hopeless case is induced not by infection nor from contact with material virus but from the fear of the disease.” Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m wondering where is all the science in this Christian Science talk?

Michelle goes on to explain that contagion is “mental rather than physical,” which will be a relief for someone suffering from severe respiratory failure: ‘It’s all in your (dumb, atheist) mind, stoopid! Just imagine some of Jesus’ oxygen filling your lungs and you’ll be out of the ICU in no time…’

Prayer, says spiritual advocate, Michelle, offers “immunity to disease.” So, it will be interesting to check the data at the end of this thing for how different communities are affected. I’m going to place a little side bet, here, that the Christian Science community, who will not accept medical treatment of any kind, not even an aspirin, are going to suffer some rather catastrophic losses to their congregations.

Let’s make an analogy: imagine you are on a ship in a storm and the ship strikes a rock, putting a hole in its hull. As it sinks, your instinct is to find a life-vest and get on a lifeboat. Now imagine your religion forbids you to accept life-saving devices because you think prayers help you float.

The lifeboats make their way down into the water, people begging you and your children to join them but you remain steadfast with your faith. Your children look to you in wonderment, their little terrified eyes beseeching you to act. You pat them on the head and make them kneel down next to you, hands in prayer, as the cold water rises over your knees. Soon, you are in the water, wet clothes pulling you down. A lifeboat stays nearby, calling to you, holding out an oar, as your children start to panic, gulping water. You remain steadfast: drowning is simply a lack of faith, a weakness in the soul’s connection to the love of God. After all: prayer makes you float; Red Bull gives you wings; Esso puts a tiger in your tank; and Opal Fruits – made to make your mouth water.

Let’s get back to Michelle: “The theology of Christian Science lifts one above fear of disease to safety and security.”

Is she imagining a Christian Science child with asthma as she speaks these words? Will she be full of Christian pride if she has fortified the spirit of Deshawn’s mother against the evil ventilator that might save his lung-ravaged life? Oh, the power of love!

Well, Jesus did say, ‘suffer little children’ (Matthew 19: 13-15) but this is out of context and the full verse is ‘Suffer little children to come unto me,’ meaning ‘allow dem little folk to come over here.’

And if we want to get all Christian fundamentalist about the Bible and take every single word to be true then what does this passage teach us?

Kings 2:23-24

“[Elisha] went up from there to Bethel; and while he was going up on the way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him, saying, ‘Go away, baldhead! Go away, baldhead!’ When he turned around and saw them, he cursed them in the name of the Lord. Then two she-bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.”

It just tells me that Elisha was a little over-sensitive about his follicly-challenged bonce. The next verse does not (but really ought to) continue like this:

“And yea, Elisha did laugh and dance upon the fleshy pieces of the boys, for God had spoken and his word was: don’t fucking mess with Elisha!”

Now, I am not in any way against religion and actually there are some scientific studies that showed patients who knew they were being prayed for have better recovery rates from illness or operation. However, there is no reason prayer cannot be used alongside medicine in treating the ill; the two things are not mutually exclusive.

Let’s see what real-life examples Michelle can find to bolster her argument:

“…people like Florence Nightingale…could work in contagious environments without sinking under disease…that when one is motivated by love, divine love…we can do whatever it is our duty to do without fear or harm.”

Hmm, let’s check this out. After a quick search, I find the following about Florence Nightingale on the Washington Times website:

 ‘The World Book Encyclopedia says she caught “Crimean fever” during a visit to the front lines and almost died. The reference book also says the “strain of overwork and her Crimean illness injured her health, and she became a semi-invalid and seldom left her rooms” for the next 40 years. Her condition fluctuated between satisfactory and critical. Her mind wandered, and she was unable to concentrate. Over the next year, she complained of spinal pain, insomnia, nervousness and depression,” the case study said.’

  Again, the power of divine love in action! Or weak, weak Nightingale – your shoddy little soul and feeble prayers were to blame. For good measure, there is evidence Florence was bipolar. If only she had listened to the ‘wise words’ of Mary Baker…

Michelle goes on to say that, “Prayer in Christian Science accomplishes what material methods cannot do.”

It’s at this point that I would like to arrange a meet-up so Boris can plant a kiss on Michelle’s prayer-protected lips, hand her a ventilator and a bottle of oxygen and see which bit of Christian and Science will accomplish the banishing of the virus inside her: the Christian prayer or the Science equipment?

With the infection of Boris and the prayer-immunity of communities like the Christian Science brigade, I think the coronavirus has really earnt its own tagline:

‘Covid-19: thinning the herd, one idiot at a time.’

Latest data for the UK (as of 11pm):

Infected: 17,089

Deaths: 1,019

Celebrity Deaths: 0

People I know who are infected: 1

Song of the Day: ‘Life During Wartime’ – Talking Heads