Viral Lessons from Downton Abbey

What exactly is one to watch when the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament is cancelled and Major League Baseball never starts? That is the question which I, like millions of others, have asked these last many weeks of ‘physical distancing’, the prescription to defeat COVID-19.  My answer was to go in the entirely opposite direction from sports. I settled on several shows to fill the gaps in my late evenings, one of which was a well-known show set in the early 1900’s, Downton Abbey. This would be my antidote to my raging Badgers and Brewers fever.

In Season Two, the aristocratic owners and servants of Downton Abbey have more to worry about than whether the table is set correctly and tea is served at the proper time. Following World War I the household is beset by the onslaught of the Spanish Flu of 1918. It leads to misery and death, striking the wealthy and the poor alike.  They either didn’t know about or believe in ‘social distancing’ and the effects on the family and friends were devastating.

Watching it in 2020, the lessons from the Abbey jump off of the screen. We are going through the same devastation their world experienced. It affects the wealthy, the poor and everyone in between. People once secure in their station in life are now thrown into doubt and fear about survival, both economically and physically.

The television series moves on to new plot lines, but, just as in real life, the effects of the pandemic change the story for the rest of their lives. People’s lives are so intertwined that the death of one affects many.  Today, as we are trying to ‘move on’ with life in our nation and in the nations of the world,  it is tempting to ignore the lessons of history and to disregard science.

 I, for one, don’t want to spend the rest of 2020 watching Downton Abbey instead of the Brewers and Badgers. But it seems to me the lessons of 1918 are clear: we either respect and defeat the virus now by ‘taking our medicine’ or we ignore the past and watch the virus defeat us, changing the plot lines of our lives, again and forever.  Good thing I have a few more seasons to watch.

"Down Into The Darkness Of The Grave"

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.

So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind.

Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned

With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.

Since Cain killed Abel humanity experiences death and its aftermath, sorrow; loneliness; regret. We know that death remains the last enemy of us all.  Still, there are times when we as a world count death.  We live in one of those times, when the death toll is reported daily. The numbers are hard to grasp.  I live in a county of about 100,000 souls. The current COVID-19 death toll has surpassed that number. Try to imagine an entire county’s population being placed in the grave within a month. Staggering.

On this Saturday we remember that God is no stranger to death. One of the Holy Trinity died. Jesus was one of the ‘loving hearts in the ground.’  More important is this: on this Saturday some 2000 years ago the molecules stirred and the resurrection body of Jesus was created anew.  May this Holy Saturday stir the faith of the hundreds of thousands grieving the deaths we count.  May they come to believe that the rock which covers the hard ground shall on the last day be moved; that the trumpet will sound;  and up from the grave shall rise victory over the last enemy.

Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave

Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;

Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.

I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.

(Dirge Without Music, Edna St. Vincent Millay; Source: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/52773/dirge-without-music )

"Saturday Night's All Right"

The party they threw for him on that Saturday night was a way of saying ‘thank you’, perhaps. Or, ‘we love you, friend’.  Maybe some of each. Martha served. Lazarus, the one Jesus had raised from the dead, reclined, along with his best friend, Jesus. Jesus’ disciples were relaxing in the house. Little did they know.

Mary had been saving her expensive perfume for a special occasion.  Tonight seemed like the right night, this Saturday night before Jesus headed down for his last ride into Jerusalem. Of course, no one other than Jesus understood that it was his last road trip. Just how close the end, and the beginning, were. Maybe Mary had an intuition that when Jesus left on Sunday morning there would not be another Saturday night dinner, not on this earth anyway.

So she poured out a pint of pure nard on his bare feet and wiped away the liquid with her long, jet-black hair. The smell filled the small house. People’s heads turned toward the dining room, wondering what the fragrance filling the air could be.  When they saw Mary’s shiny hair and Jesus’ drying feet, and the bottle lying nearby they understood what had happened. It irked Judas Iscariot to no end. “What a waste! That perfume could have been sold and the money given to the poor (minus my thief’s cut).”

Jesus was having none of that noise.  “Leave her alone.” What Mary did that Saturday night before Palm Sunday was pure worship of Jesus. She understood who this man was, that he was the Messiah.  And if all of the rumors of the plots to kill him were true, well, perhaps he would not return.  There was no point in saving for tomorrow the act of worship she could do tonight.

We all have a little bit of Judas in us, wanting to save the good stuff for ourselves. We all have a little bit of Mary in us, wanting to worship our Lord and Savior.  Imagine Jesus at the dinner table tonight. You and your family and friends gathered round, one last time before Jesus begins the long walk to the tomb.

What could you do tonight to show Jesus how much he means to you?

(based on John 12:2-8; cf. Matthew 26:6-13)