A spiritual message
Another Spiritual Message heard from:
A charismatic and outspoken pastor with a national following drew hundreds to a Snohomish church Wednesday to hear a spiritual message, while some embraced another message the pastor has made repeatedly in Facebook videos: He is adamantly against rules about being forced to wear a mask in public.
That’s redundant, and a thumb on the scales in favor of the “charismatic” (says who?) pastor – there are rules about wearing a mask in public, there are no “rules about being forced to wear a mask in public.” Nobody comes up to you and pins you to a wall and glues a mask to your face. There are potential fines and there is the possibility of being asked to leave, and escorted out if you refuse to leave, but there is no physical forcing people to wear masks.
While speaking to more than 2 million Facebook followers across the country, Tennessee Pastor Greg Locke admits taking bold, controversial stands on religious and political issues, and he makes it very clear — he regards wearing a mask as an insulting violation of both his religious and political expression.
More wording that makes the pastor sound more reasonable than he is. Telling people not to wear masks isn’t “bold” and it isn’t merely “controversial” and it is in no way either a religious or a political issue, it is a medical issue.
So when hundreds of people gathered to see Pastor Locke speak at The House Ministry Center near Snohomish, subtle anti-mask messages were seen emblazoned on T-shirts. Most people attending walked through the smoky haze without wearing a mask.
The smoky haze has nothing to do with it; ordinary face masks do nothing to protect us from the smoke.
One attendee, who asked not to be identified, told KIRO 7, “This is about freedom. The place is packed, there’s no social distancing, people embrace and people are not wearing masks because we believe in the freedom to worship the way we choose to worship.”
But no one is hindering their freedom to worship, or trying to hinder it. And “this” is not about freedom; it’s about not killing other people. Your mask protects other people – and their masks protect you. It’s a social contract in miniature. Your refusal to wear a mask puts other people at risk, not you. I’m not seeing the spiritual grandeur here.
Governor Inslee’s Safe Start plan indicates religious services must be at only 25% of a building’s capacity or up to 200 people, whichever is less, and everyone inside is mandated to wear a mask.
KIRO 7 learned the Snohomish County Health department called the church, and indicated a message was not returned. Snohomish County Sheriff Adam Fortney has called Gov. Jay Inslee’s stay-home order “unconstitutional” and said he would not enforce it.
Let’s have more contagion in Snohomish County. Freedomfreedomfreedom.
Isn’t there some way that we could spin mask-wearing as “supporting the troops,” and suddenly get these people to brag about how THEY wear masks all the time, not like those librul antifa folks! “Why, I wear two masks, because I support the troops TWICE as much!”
Or or or we could tell them it protects them from libbrul cooties – that should do it!
On a serious note, though, this is why I find some of the recent “defenses” of Trump exasperating. Yes, of course a lot of people would have gotten sick and many would have died even with a great response from the federal government. But even aside from the somewhat-behind-the-scenes goings-on at the CDC and FDA and the task force, etc. (and we know at least some of that was botched or politically corrupt), the way that Trump chose to turn “taking COVID seriously” in general, and mask-wearing in particular, into culture-war fodder, has undoubtedly taken a toll.
You have the CDC director emphasizing that social distancing and mask-wearing are the best tools we have, and both of those have been undermined needlessly.