Europeans Thank Healthcare Professionals Amidst COVID-19 Coronavirus Pandemic

“In a gesture of gratitude for doctors, nurses and other medical workers who work in Spain’s national health system, people went to their balconies all over the country at 10 p.m. local time to applaud in unison.”

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/03/16/816309232/global-deaths-from-coronavirus-surpass-6-000

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Folks in America would ~NEVER~ do anything even remotely like that.

And, that’s quite sad, indeed, given that gratitude – which is among, if not THE most “Christian” of all human expressions – isn’t practiced on a broad collective level by an ostensibly “Christian” nation.

Perhaps the nation’s churches, synagogues, temples, mosques, and other houses of worship should reconsider the merit their work has, or has accomplished, given as much.

And “yes,” regardless of one’s personal, or religious opinion of the Christ’s teachings, or claims of divinity, most faith traditions – especially the closely-related faith practices of Islam, Judaism, and Christendom (ecumenism), including those of Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism, Jainism, etc. – celebrate the principles, teachings, and/or respect the purpose, reason, and cause to, and for which, his self-stated initiative was devoted – acceptance, love, and respect of everyone, and the selfsame expression of that love, and demonstration of acceptance and respect, which inherently includes forgiveness, by and through selfless actions for others’ benefit, without regard for any other factor.

While I have seen, and experienced some “messages of gratitude for these and other essential workers” personally, mine are anecdotal, while the observation and citation referenced above, is not.

My greater point is not individualism, but collectivism — a unified expression of gratitude on a national basis, as in “they were all in one accord.”

And, might I add, simultaneous.

The closest thing we have in that regard is Thanksgiving, or Independence Day, both which are both national holidays, though one has religious overtones, while the other does not.

See also:

BY LORI HINNANT
Friday, 20 March 2020

PARIS (AP) — At a time of isolation, people in many European cities hit hard by the new coronavirus are taking at least a minute each night to come together in gratitude.

They stand at open windows or on balconies in Rome, Madrid, Paris, Athens and Amsterdam, singing, cheering and applauding even though they know their intended audience is too busy to listen.

The adulation is for the doctors, nurses and other health care workers putting themselves at risk on the front lines of the pandemic that is forcing most residents to stay home. A 52-year-old nurse on Thursday became the first medical professional in Spain to die of COVID-19.

In Italy, where the number of virus-related deaths surpassed those in China, 2,900 health care providers have been infected, or 10% of the country’s total. Italian broadcasters regularly feature exhausted doctors and nurses begging people to stay home and expressing a sense of abandonment over inadequate protective gear.

The Dutch health minister collapsed from exhaustion in the midst of a parliamentary session on Wednesday.

“We’re clapping tonight out of respect and to say thank you to all the health care workers in the Netherlands who are protecting us against this horrible coronavirus,” King Willem-Alexander said while observing the ritual Tuesday night with his family at Palace Huis ten Bosch in The Hague.

A nightly minute of applause for medical workers is becoming a new tradition in many cities in Europe hit hard by the coronavirus. (March 19)

The word spread mostly through the WhatsApp messaging service. In France, where the head of the national doctors’ federation picked up the virus from a diabetic patient, the call went out seemingly spontaneously by text messages hours after a nationwide lockdown went into effect Tuesday. Windows opened promptly at 8 p.m. then and again on Wednesday.

“In this period of crisis, we are going to see the most beautiful things humanity has to offer, but also perhaps the darkest,” French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said.

In Brussels and other cities, the intended audience for the nightly chorus of thanks was expanded to everyone working to keep essential services running in Belgium, such as firefighters, supermarket workers and trash collectors.

Virus OutbreakFull Coverage:
In Spain, people are singing Mónica Naranjo’s popular cover of the disco-era tune “I Will Survive” with the lyrics tweaked to say, “I will survive/I’ll look for a home/Among the rubble of my loneliness/Strange paradise/Where you are missed.”

Workers at one hospital responded with a video recorded in the facility’s corridors. Standing in a small group and wearing masks, they held up one sign after another with messages that included, “We are all in this together.” Then, they gave a minute of applause for their home-bound admirers.

https://apnews.com/63bb9038a3fc719cb1370cd8ce4773b3