This week's Community Column is written by the Rev Christine Murdoch, minister at the Church of Scotland's Lochside Linkage in Garelochhead and the Rosneath peninsula.
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For the past four months we have been learning to live in a new way.
I suspect many of us thought that “lockdown’ might be a relatively short lived experience and we would all come out of it at the same time and in the same way.
What has become clear is that we are going to have to learn to live, safely, with the virus. As the experts tell us, that means maintaining good hand hygiene and socially distancing ourselves from other people.
Living in Kilcreggan, that has been relatively easy. In general, the people I have met have observed the advice and the rules.
However, recently I had to make a visit to a well-known computer store in Braehead, and I realised I was no longer in charge of my own social distancing, but was at the mercy of strangers. I don’t mind saying, I felt very vulnerable.
In Genesis chapter 4, we read of Cain killing his brother Abel. When asked by God, “Where is your brother Abel?” Cain said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?”
The truth is that we are indeed each other’s keepers. My actions have an effect on other people.
That has been made very clear in recent months – and we all have a moral as well as a legal obligation to maintain the rules for as long as the virus is with us.
READ MORE: Back to school this week...but how will it work in Helensburgh and Lomond?
However, I do accept that the advice can seem contradictory.
Over the next few days, our children will return to school for the first time since March. That may well be a frightening thought for both parents and teachers (many of whom are parents themselves).
School chaplains are not just there for the pupils; they are also there to support teachers. If any teacher needs to talk through their concerns, please feel free to speak to a chaplain.
I suspect it will be a while before I can lead assembly again, so I would like to wish all our new Primary 1 and S1 pupils all the best for this next stage in their lives.
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