In making his point, Father White presents us with a classic example of a-historical Thomism, presenting abstract categories which can only have meaning in an article on a current crisis if they are contextualized according to time and place. To give one instance, what does Father White mean by “the state” at a moment like this, when the power of the state is being usurped by experts like Bill Gates who speak in the name of “science,” as a way of abrogating representative government? Is it causing division to bring up points like this? Or is the division already there? “Nor is it helpful,” Father White tells us, “to utter the tone-deaf claim that the COVID-19 pandemic is not so bad and that people are overreacting. People are not overreacting when they grieve as their patients, friends, or family members die by the thousands.”
But what if thousands are not dying? What if the statistics are inflated? What if the economic consequences of the cure are worse than the medical consequences of the disease? What about contextualizing the pandemic geographically? So far only one person has died in St. Joseph County, where I live. Why then should the government impose New York standards where they do not apply? Is this why the United States is divided into states?
Father White claims that “Christians ought to treat this pandemic as an opportunity to learn more about God” and what they can do “to console both their religious and secular neighbors?” What about consoling the economically vulnerable who have lost their jobs? What about the debate about how long the quarantine is supposed to last? Is it “spiritually corrosive” to engage in that debate?
A-historical Thomism fits in well with a supine attitude toward the “state” and “science,” but it doesn’t get to the heart of the matter in dealing with something as geographically particular and time-bound as the coronavirus pandemic. The answer to all of these questions is prudence, the ability to recognize the truth and to act on it.
In this particular context that means the ability to answer a series of specific questions, like who speaks for the state? Is it Donald Trump or Bill Gates? Who speaks for science? Is it Anthony Fauci, the mouth of Big Pharma, or a host of German professors who say the pandemic is over and draconian measures no longer necessary? Who decides when the epidemic is over? The experts or officials elected by the people?
