Over the weekend, Pierce County reached the very high-risk level category which is designated by the color red on Covidactnow.org. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) also has moved our county from substantial to high community transmission of the virus. We now have as many cases in Pierce County of COVID-19 as we did in November 2020. As we follow the daily number of cases that the Tacoma Pierce County Health Department reports, the trend line continues to show a rising number of cases. In following our reopening plan developed by the leadership of this congregation, we will be closing our building once again.

Throughout this pandemic, your leaders have followed the rise and fall of cases in our county and around the country. We have stayed up to date on guidance from our bishop and state and county health departments. This past week a few changes have taken place that are changing how we are moving forward.

In the beginning months of the pandemic, many of us experienced huge changes to our schedules and routines. Our regular groups and activities stopped meeting. Schools, non-essential workplaces, and church buildings closed. Many annual vacations and family gatherings were cancelled. Depending on life circumstances, some people found themselves with an overabundance of free time, while others found themselves stretched thin with new responsibilities at work and home.

As our family prepares for our eldest daughter’s graduation from high school and our other girls graduating from elementary school, I am acutely aware of how much our girls have grown over the years. Yet, as I watch old videos, I am equally reminded of how much their personalities have remained the same. It has been a joy to watch these changes happen over the years, but it is only in looking back, that we can see the magnitude of the transformations.

I am an avid Star Trek fan. Recently, I’ve been watching the series, Star Trek: Enterprise. The theme song for this series is based on Rod Stewart’s song Faith of the Heart. The opening lyrics are: “It’s been a long road, getting from there to here.” Every time I hear these words, I think of the last 15 months. It has been a long road, and many of us are tired and exhausted by this pandemic. When it began in March of 2020, none of us anticipated it would be over a year before we would gather again.

Each year on this weekend, my parents would rustle up my siblings and I and take us to the cemetery. We would bring with us our large concrete pots filled with plastic flowers and place them on our relatives’ graves. It was not my favorite activity, but I did enjoy hearing the stories my parents would tell us about each person.

A few weeks ago, I was able to make a pastoral hospital visit for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic. While hospital visitors continue to be restricted, clergy are now allowed to see non-Covid patients. And thanks to being fully vaccinated, I can safely make visits again. As I walked into the hospital, I was surprised by how normal it felt to resume this part of ministry. Aside from an emptier parking lot and screening questions at the door, Good Samaritan seemed relatively unchanged from my perspective as a visitor.

For the past six years, I’ve kept a brief daily journal. The format I use sets up each day with room for five consecutive years of journal entries. Which means that when I write my daily entry, I also can read what I wrote on that date the previous year. As I’ve been reading through last year’s entries for March, April, and May, I’m amazed at how many changes we absorbed in a very short span of time. Grocery store shortages, on-line worship, cancelled spring and summer plans, school closures, zoom meetings, our church merger vote…the changes kept coming.