Válaszkeresés járvány idején a felmerülő erkölcsi kérdésekre
Authors: Kránitz Mihály 
Published: December 2021

Összefoglaló. Most már második éve általános tapasztalat – és
nemcsak egy kis területen, hanem az egész világon – a COVID–19 halálos járvány
terjedése (az elnevezés pontosan: SARS-CoV-2), amelyet már nem lehetett egyszerű
megfázásnak vagy gyorsan elmúló betegségnek tekinteni, hanem egy olyan súlyos
állapotnak, mely fenyegeti minden ember életét, függetlenül attól, hogy ki hol
él. Az egészségügyi kutatók az ellenanyag kifejlesztéséért küzdöttek, mely
megállíthatja a vírus terjedését. A gyógyítás kérdései mellett azonban
filozófiai és vallási kérdések is felmerültek, melyekre pszichológusok és
hittudósok is keresik a választ. Az ember teremtettségéből és szabad akaratából
kiindulva a jelen tanulmány a Bibliában közölt kinyilatkoztatás és a keresztény
tanítás alapján vállalkozik nemcsak lehetséges válaszokat adni, hanem a járvány
komolyságával számolva a jelenség hitbeli és teológiai magyarázatát is
megfogalmazni.

Summary. The Covid-19 epidemic, which began in late 2019 and early
2020, has reached everyone: the family, the workplace, and public life. The
phenomenon also requires a comprehensive solution. The unfortunate experience
has taught everyone that there is no age limit for the virus because it affects
everyone equally. It has become clear that it is not individual solutions that
are needed, but only community path finding, that no one lives alone in
isolation. Throughout its two-thousand-year history, Christianity has
accompanied man in both its successes and failures.

God’s revelation-based teaching is unchanged and to this day He provides His
resulting answers to everyone by placing the whole man before God. This
Christian-minded anthropology means that man lives in a personal relationship
that assigns him to God alone. In terms of faith, it thus approaches the crisis,
the disease, the drama of being, in a different way, which sees the reality of
life and death in a greater context.

The spread of the current epidemic has been interpreted by many as a divine
punishment. But God, the Creator, who is good, cannot be the source of good and
evil at the same time, he cannot be the starting point of evil. It is precisely
because of these characteristics that spiritual and moral behavior is valued in
the epidemiological situation. Christianity does not see God-consciously
directing punitive action in unpleasant events for people and humanity, as God
is first and foremost a Father.

In the Old Testament, there is no connection between a particular disease or
other plague and the personal sins of those who suffer it. Far from the New
Testament, the conclusion is that it links the plagues, diseases, and epidemics
we experience to the sins committed by individual people. The turn of the New
Testament, then, is also significant in the presentation of God. It is no longer
the image of the fearsome and terrible God that emerges, but the teaching of
Jesus, who says of His Father, “God is love.” The God of the New Testament is a
God of co-suffering and compassion who thinks not of punishment but of
forgiveness.

Troubles are not necessarily attributable to the sins of individuals, but
actually to the sins of all mankind. Therefore, it is necessary for everyone to
feel somehow responsible for the other when they see that their sins continue.
However, the viral situation has also shown unparalleled human behaviors and
values, especially on the part of healthcare professionals. Perhaps
involuntarily, among those who acted for others, man’s better self manifested
itself, so they were able to make sacrifices as well. Of them, too, Jesus said,
just before his suffering, that “no one loves more than he who gives his life
for his friends.” It is love that overcomes fear, that can be the cure for a
virus.