CLINICAL MATTER
As Filipino Catholics observed Holy Week on the third year of the pandemic, churches were once again full to capacity and the pilgrimage sites were bursting at the seams with people. With the lifting of most of the minimum public health standards, the faithful have trooped back in full force to hear the Word of God and to receive Holy Communion in person. Many dioceses are lifting the dispensation of Sundays and holy days of obligation that were put in place during the pandemic when most people could only attend online mass. At Palm Sunday mass, the vendors of the palm fronds or “palaspas” were doing good business as people eagerly flocked to the altar waving their palaspas during the Gospel reading. Celebrating our faith with the community physically gathered together is a much more meaningful experience for Filipino Catholics.
The Catholic Church was an essential partner in the pandemic response. The Church leadership readily cooperated with government policies and shut down nearly all physical services during the lockdowns. Masses were broadcast online, and religious communities organized aid for parishioners who could not work or who became sick with Covid-19.
The Church strongly supported the global vaccination program, with Pope Francis declaring that getting vaccinated was a moral obligation to protect not just ourselves but those around us. There was a brief controversy on whether vaccines developed from embryonic cell lines that might have been sourced from abortions was anathema, but the Vatican doctrine office quickly addressed this as morally acceptable given the ongoing pandemic emergency.
Following the massive vaccination campaign in 2021 and shortly after the Omicron wave in January 2022, people started to return to the churches to hear mass face to face albeit with enhanced safety measures. Church pews had markers to maintain physical distance and seating capacity was limited to 30 percent. Only vaccinated parishioners were initially allowed to attend. Masking was mandatory. Those at risk for severe Covid-19, including the elderly and those with comorbid conditions, were discouraged from attending mass in person. Throughout 2022, the number of people allowed in church was gradually increased until eventually all capacity controls were lifted. Even after the mask mandates were rescinded at the end of October 2022, most people continued to wear masks, understanding that masks didn’t only protect against Covid-19 but other respiratory diseases as well.
Many healthcare workers relied on religion and prayer in the darkest days of the pandemic. When I was quarantined in 2021 following a high risk Covid-19 exposure, I started praying the rosary every night to calm my anxious mind and it helped me sleep peacefully. When we took care of Covid-19 patients while wearing full PPE, many of us silently prayed that our equipment would protect us and we gave thanks when another screening RT-PCR came back negative.
Most of all, we prayed for our patients, especially those who were dying without their loved ones at their side because of quarantine and isolation protocols. Too often, healthcare workers were the only ones physically present when someone passed. We did our best to hold a tablet or phone to give a dying patient’s family as much time as they could online. Many times, we thought about our own families—what we would do in such a situation or if we ourselves became patients. Too many people who died were denied the dignity of a proper celebration of their lives. Many families had to delay the completion of their grieving process as we all waited for the public health emergency to end.
When our own colleagues died, we saved our tears for the future because we still had a job to do. We quietly prayed for their souls, promising to honor their lives and their sacrifices when the crisis was past.
The medical profession has always been an altruistic one. There are many parallels between being a good Christian and being a healthcare worker. Taken from a Christian standpoint, there is no profession that better embodies the ideal of love: No greater love does a man have than to lay down his life for his friends. More times than I care to remember, this became the case for our colleagues who were lost in the fight against Covid-19. Even as some of our comrades fell, others stepped up to take their place. Medical students, interns, and colleagues from non-clinical specialties offered their services to patients when hospitals and clinics were short-staffed. Retired doctors dusted off their stethoscopes and volunteered to see patients.
My own father-in-law, National Scientist and Ramon Magsaysay awardee Dr. Ernesto Domingo, continued seeing his patients despite our family’s vigorous protests. He resumed clinic before the Covid-19 vaccines became available. At 83 years old, he was in the highest risk group of all. When we tried to stop him out of concern for his safety, he gruffly answered us with this question: “Who will see my patients?” and then he went off to his clinic. I am glad he survived.
The essence of Christianity is God’s love for man to the point of sending his only Son to save us from our sins. Holy Week gives us a chance to reflect on this tremendous love and the healing power of our faith. An oft-quoted line during times of war is, “There are no atheists in foxholes.” This quote embodies the feeling that in times of great stress and uncertainty, we turn to religion for hope. God didn’t merely exist for us healthcare workers as we fought for the lives of our countrymen. He was there with us in the trenches, wiping away our tears and giving us the courage and strength to carry on. There is no other explanation for one of the lowest death rates from Covid-19 in the world despite our lack of resources. It should have been a complete disaster. Instead, in what can only be described as miraculous, we were saved.