Covid 19 and Easter

As nurses working on the frontlines, management, teaching, or research, our work routines have been disrupted by COVID-19. Our ways of doing things have changed – from having to wear Personal Protective Equipment (or improvise PPE), working longer hours, seeing more people die and colleagues fall ill, or learning how to do things differently because of ‘social-distancing’. Our education and experience haven’t prepared us fully to deal with these changes, including the fears we have for our own health and that of those around us.
This week, as we prepare to celebrate Easter, it might be helpful to reflect on what it was like for Jesus’ disciples.  It must have been a time full of confusion, bewilderment, swinging emotions, fear, disbelief, sleepless nights, and sorrow. Many nurses and other health care workers are  going through similar emotions now. The emotions are real and difficult. But keep holding on! Use your professional knowledge to keep providing the best care possible. And keep hopeful. Remember that Christ has conquered death and that these times of suffering are temporary.
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials (1 Peter 1:3-6)
Anne Biro
Vice-President, Nurses Christian Fellowship International