The Opportunity Before Us

The global change sparked in 1918/1919 is astounding. That is when the First World War came to an end, and the Spanish flu infected one-third of the global population, killing up to 50 million people, maybe more.

Geopolitically the world witnessed its first attempt at international intergovernmental diplomacy through the League of Nations. The Treaty of Versailles set the stage for German resentment and the rise of Naziism. And the Middle East was carved up along colonialist lines into nations that had no historical precedent. The world we inherited, even generations later, was shaped in that moment.

Sociologically (in the US) the War added momentum to the women’s suffrage movement as their part in the war effort proved they were as deserving of citizenship as men. Congress passed the 19th amendment in 1919, and the States ratified it the next year. For similar reasons the end of the War signaled the beginning of the 20th century civil rights movement. Black soldiers returned from the War as heroes only to discover that their social status had not changed. Indeed the National Museum of African American History and Culture just opened an exhibit that explores the role that WWI and its aftermath has had in shaping modern black identity. We continue to enjoy those advances while still advocating for needed reform.

In terms of public health, the pandemic helped scientists understand the nature of viruses and accelerated the process of developing vaccines to combat future outbreaks. Once the crisis had passed national government took steps in the 1920s to expand access to health care, either through socialized medicine (Russia, Germany, France, the UK) or through employer-based private insurance (the US). Lessons learned in those two years have shaped our present response to COVID-19.

Theologically the horrors of the Great War left triumphalist continental liberalism shattered and set the stage for Karl Barth’s commentary on Romans (published in 1919) that signaled the birth of Neo-Orthodoxy. In the States the pushback against modernism took the form of fundamentalism, a term coined in 1920 to describe an interdenominational subset of churches that defended supernatural doctrines like the inspiration of Scripture and the resurrection of Christ. The War was also formative for a host of influential Christian thinkers, such as C. S. Lewis whose experiences in the Great War transformed the rest of his life and directly shaped some of his best-known books.

The list could go on and on.

There is so much that already consumes our prayers, and rightly so—the welfare of the vulnerable, the health of the elderly and the sick, the well-being of doctors and nurses on the frontlines, the care of our families and friends, the mental health of those under strict quarantine, our local and state and national officials, divine mercy for all people everywhere.

But as we pray, we mustn’t forget the broader narratives that God is writing—in technology, in ethics, in public policy, in scientific discovery, in sociology, in theology, in the church, everywhere. Let’s pray with fresh imagination for God to reshape our world and our churches through this present crisis. And by his grace let’s lean into that vision and set to work creating relationships and structures and art and words that reflect God’s joy in us for the good of the world.