Like 20/20 vision, the year 2020 has challenged our social and political sight. This year has brought America, and indeed the world, to an interesting...

COLUMBIA, MARYLAND, UNITED STATES, June 2, 2020 /EINPresswire.com/ -- The term 20/20 vision refers to normalized visual acuity. It is a distinction that points to perfect eyesight in the context of normal vision. Thus, 20/20 vision is not divided by gender, sexual orientation, class, creed, or color. It is human sight, albeit, perfectly normal, which is naturally occurring or corrected to the state of 20/20 vision. It is a divine design.

Like 20/20 vision, the year 2020 has challenged our social and political sight. This year has brought America, and indeed the world, to an interesting intersection that has exposed the vulnerabilities of all humanity. This year has challenged the political notions of a US versus THEM theory. As nations have erected borders of safety and land demarcations, the COVID-19 pandemic has either directly or indirectly affected all of us as global citizens by usurping those walls of division, and proving that all humanity shares likeness and sameness.

The only known weapon against this pandemic – which has quite frankly caught even infectious disease and epidemiological professionals off guard – has been scientists and medical professionals of various nations openly sharing with scientists and medical professionals of other countries. The vastness and velocity of COVID’s spread, coupled with the catastrophic outcomes that hospitals were witnessing, demanded that geo-political otherness be immediately dismissed for nations to fight the pandemic in unity. As COVID-19 has shown America and the world that there must be global cohesion – a kind of symmetry of sight and practice – the same attitude must be adopted and demonstrated in Howard County.

On Friday, May 29, Howard County began the rollback of the mandated quarantine to start the first phase of reopening businesses. Unfortunately, this process has exposed ugly fault lines. Divisive language has been used that all too often mirrors the rhetoric of our national political culture. We must not allow racism to rise and proliferate within the culture of our county. We must be united. We must see collectively with a 20/20 foresight, one that is born of a healthy and tolerant insight.

In our view, County Executive Ball and our county government have not attempted to deny any business owner or citizen his or her rights. Instead, we witnessed a strategy of caution that studied national best practices, coupled with the fluctuating metrics that our scientists were reporting.

We commend County Executive Ball for not buckling to the political pressure of those who were calling for Howard County to rush to reopen. In our view, the slow, measured reopening approach has saved lives. County Executive Calvin Ball has saved lives.

The fact is that 2020 has introduced us all to an unwanted, and some might say unmerited darkness. We must join together with determination to be the light which dispels that darkness. In unity, as one Howard County, we must reach a 20/20 focus that allows us to see ourselves through the COVID-19 pandemic.

The road forward may have its bumps, twists, and inconvenient turns, but we who travel upon it must be united, and data- and not date- driven. Like the fabled phoenix that rises from the ash heap of despair to soar towards the lofty air of victory, Howard County will emerge stronger and better together.

Dr. Robert A. F. Turner, Sr. Pastor
St John Baptist Church
People Acting Together in Howard (PATH)

With additional PATH Clergy Leaders:
Rev. Paige Getty, Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbia, Co-Chair
Rev. Tyrone P. Jones, First Baptist Church of Guilford, Co-Chair
Rev. Mary Ka Kanahan, St. John United Church
Rabbi Susan Grossman, Beth Shalom Synagogue
Rev. Phil Curran, Columbia United Christian Church
Rev. Ostein Truitt, St John Baptist Church
Rev. Rickey Harvey Jr., St John Baptist Church

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