Protect the weaker amongst us — wear a mask

Editor: When did you learn about heroes? For me it was at a young age. In the mid-1960s I became a fan of a television show. Since my parents worked in the television industry, it took only a phone call, and there I was, meeting Adam West, white terry cloth robe draped over his Batman costume. He was my hero. Not so much because he fought fictional foes, but because throughout the series my hero taught me what it took to be a “good citizen.”

We live in a day today where wearing a mask can also become an outward mark of a good citizen. There are some people, those over 60, those with compromised immune systems, who are susceptible to the COVID-19 virus; an invisible evil that can be transmitted from person to person, perhaps even carried by healthy citizens like me, where it springboards off to infect another. So, what to do?

Be a good citizen! As the rector of Episcopal Church of St. John the Baptist, a lifelong Episcopalian and California born, I am grateful to follow another hero, Jesus, who teaches those of us who follow him to care for the “least of these.” Like my boyhood hero, my lifelong one teaches me that I must rise above my own thoughts, desires, or that of a political party that pulls me one way or another, mask on or mask off to make a statement.

Rising above the ways of the world and caring for the citizen is part of who I am as a Christian. It is also who Batman, on TV, taught me to be; a good citizen. What do I do for the least of these in Lodi is I follow Jesus, like a good citizen and I wear a mask. What about you, my fellow citizen? Do you have what it takes to protect the needy and be a hero? Join me, and let’s life the life that our heroes taught us, and protect the weaker amongst us by wearing a mask.

REV. PETER ACKERMAN

Lodi