The greatest commandment is to love God and our neighbor. How do we love our neighbors in a time of worldwide pandemic like coronavirus -- a time when we must maintain social distance, avoid gatherings, and stay at home? God has provided us with tools. Technology is a gift, meant to be used in gratitude, along with all the gifts of creation and culture. We can use that gift today in the face of nationwide lockdowns and mounting infections.
First, we can love our neighbors using existing technology. Even before this outbreak, my wife and I regularly depended on Facebook, Facetime, and other social media to connect with our children and grandchildren that live out of state. Today, we are finding video chat services to be even more essential, even for relatives that live nearby. News sites on the web keep us up to date, including sites using GIS (Geographic Information System) to help us monitor the spread of the virus. Home delivery services help minimize contact while obtaining essential supplies like milk, fruit, ... and chocolate!
Families are not the only ones leveraging electronic communication at this time. Many churches have switched their worship services from physical to virtual, streaming the sermon and music to their congregation members who are all watching from home. I am currently serving on our church council. We held our most recent elder's meeting using Google Hangouts, including a time of praying together. I imagined it might be awkward trying to deliberate over decisions and closing with an open prayer time, but it worked quite well! Employers are finding creative ways to keep their businesses running while most employees work from home, using messaging services, file sharing, distributed revision control systems, and more. Schools are turning to online instruction while their campuses remain closed. Each of these organizations is loving their neighbor, whether they be parishioners, employees, or students.
Second, we can love our neighbors by creating new technology. Engineers and scientists worldwide are contributing to the fight against Coronavirus, but they are not the only ones who can invent. All of us reflect God's image, and part of that "imago dei" is creativity. We adapt and make do. We strap together make-shift tools with duct tape and wire. We use the resources we have at hand to get the job done. We are a little like the engineers in that scene from Apollo 13 where they needed to make a square peg fit in a round hole, when the filters began failing on the disabled spacecraft.
If God is the father of creativity, necessity has always been the mother of invention. The dire need driven by Coronavirus today is driving new innovation. Check out these stories of creative people solving problems with tech:
- Hospitals turn to crowdsourcing and 3D printing amid equipment shortages
- Folding@Home Now More Powerful Than World's Top 7 Supercomputers, Combined
- How Arizona sewing enthusiasts are helping solve the face mask shortage
Whether it is a high-tech solution using 3D printers or supercomputers, or a commonplace tech like sewing machines, all these tools -- and more -- should be employed in the fight against coronavirus. Perhaps you are one of the many good people standing in the frontlines to provide medical care, deliver supplies, and keep shelves stocked with food. I am awed by your bravery and grateful for your service. I pray that God grants you safety, patience, wisdom, and creativity. Perhaps you are not a first responder in this crisis -- but you can play a part in the solution. Stay home so that you do not spread the disease, but get creative. Can you write a word of encouragement to a friend who is feeling particularly isolated? Can you write a song to help your family pass the time? Can you develop software to help smooth the logistics of medical supply delivery? Can you analyze the data to determine more accurately who is most at risk? Can you invent a better ventilator? Can you find a vaccine? Likely no one person can say yes to all of these, but everyone can find a way to express God-given creativity. Some of those expressions will be new technology, designing our devices to enable us to show some love to our neighbors, wherever they might be in the world.
