New Variant and the New Normal

The new, mutated Covid variant is said to spread easier and faster. With people getting more lax and carefree today, the new variant is bound to change the new normal. New normal used to mean a new way of living daily life, specifically referring to the regular wearing of face masks and shield plus social distancing, shortened work hours and living almost half of life online. Photo by Mika Baumeister on Unsplash.

But we've changed that over the months. New normal to us now is how we want to go back to life years ago and do that by throwing all safety protocols out the window. Well, yeah we pretend to be doing them but in worst ways we can. I call it the New New Normal.

And now the new variant enters the scene. Experts say it doesn't make Covid deadlier but helps it spread faster. So unless we change the new normal, we help this new variant accomplish its mission. Dr. John Wong, epidemiologist and founder of EpiMetrics, claims that the cases in the Philippines could grow 15 times if the new variant becomes a "dominant species."

“If the variant takes over, the 20,000 cases can become almost 300,000 cases by the end of the month. This is what we want to avoid,” ABS CBN quoted the doctor as saying.

Again, for a while this new variant scared us, but not for long--the same way we reacted to the original Covid last year. After a while, we're immediately back to business as usual--even with the reported cases rising everywhere and death tolls climbing. After hearing so much about these things, we've grown callous to it all, and going back to the belief that it will never happen to us, especially because we believe our religion or church attendance or God will protect us.

That's how we define the new normal today, and it's seen by how we live it on a daily basis. Face masks worn on the chin, face shields worn on the head, and being mindless about social distancing. Companies and schools requiring daily face-to-face work again--all these especially in crowded places. Staying out even if it's not necessary. Risking infection just to be in malls. Partying. People talking and laughing loudly in close spaces. 

We're actually prepping an easy way in for the new variant.

The only solution is to go back to the genuine new normal, strictly keeping all urgent safety protocols intact, and seriously at that. Doing more things online than face-to-face and keeping folks indoors as much as possible. Actually, these things don't need law enforcement if we all realize how we're responsible for one another. 

And if government will wisely think up of really needed protocols and measures.

No more silly ideas like motorcycle shields, face-to-face schooling, issuing statements like kids staying home would more likely catch Covid than if they were in school. No more enforcing distancing among members of the family who live in the same house (or separating couples in vehicles or restaurants). And especially no more exemptions to rules in favor of public officials. 

These are the things that make people abandon and trash all safety protocols.

And God keeping you safe even if you go out and have church? Well, believers and priests and pastors getting the Covid is a clear indication that God is up to something else, NOT protecting church folks using Him to stubbornly defy the authorities. Churches have been praying for the Covid to disappear and look what's happened? Covid didn't go away. It's become even faster so that many governments are contemplating lockdowns anew. What happened to our prayers?

Because it seems God is tired about what we do in church purportedly "for him." He finds nothing in it but man's religion, enthroning what man can do. So he himself seems to be closing it down, pushing us into a corner where we find ourselves so helpless that all we can do is listen to his words in the bible--and take them really seriously this time.

“I hate, I despise your religious festivals;
your assemblies are a stench to me.
22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them.
Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,
I will have no regard for them.
23 Away with the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.
24 But let justice roll on like a river,
righteousness like a never-failing stream! [Amos 5]

And "justice" here does not mean we march out in the streets to protest against injustices or election frauds or fight against human rights violations--just having ourselves used by politicians. It means maintaining genuine godly relationships (how we ourselves treat others) that flow endlessly into "righteousness like a never-ending stream."