“Because of the global burden of infection that’s out there, it’s going to be very tough to put the genie back in the bottle,” Sweat said. “This idea that…well it will eventually go away or it’s gone away, everything is back to normal…is just not going to happen. So, we need to think about our public health strategies, work on getting people vaccinated. We may likely need boosters in the future. So, I believe we are into an endemic stage, and it’s hard to take that in a way. It’s kind of like we were hoping we could get rid of this. Doesn’t mean we can’t manage it and get back to our lives though.”

Sweat suggested the focus should now be on managing COVID-19 infections, especially as schools prepare to reopen next month.

“One of the big issues on the horizon right now facing us, next month schools reconvene,” Sweat said. “The state government has limited mandating masks in schools.”

Read it all.

As COVID-19 infections rise once again in South Carolina, some doctors warn we could be dealing with the coronavirus for years to come https://t.co/nAp0gmyDoh

— Live5News (@Live5News) July 23, 2021

One Sunday, shortly before my 28th birthday, I walked into a church for the first time as someone earnestly seeking God. Before long I found myself overwhelmed. At last I was fully known and seen and, I realised, unconditionally loved – perhaps I had a sense of relief from no longer running from God. A friend gave me C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity, and one night, after a couple months of attending church, I knelt in my closet in my apartment and asked Jesus to save me, and to become the Lord of my life.

From there, I started a rigorous diet of theology, reading the Bible and exploring theologians such as Reinhold Niebuhr, Paul Ramsey, and F.D. Maurice. Christianity, it turned out, looked nothing like the caricature I once held. I found the story of Jacob wrestling with God especially compelling: God wants anything but the unthinking faith I had once assumed characterized Christianity. God wants us to wrestle with Him; to struggle through doubt and faith, sorrow and hope. Moreover, God wants broken people, not self-righteous ones. And salvation is not about us earning our way to some place in the clouds through good works. On the contrary; there is nothing we can do to reconcile ourselves to God. As a historian, this made profound sense to me. I was too aware of the cycles of poverty, violence and injustice in human history to think that some utopian design of our own, scientific or otherwise, might save us.

Christianity was also, to my surprise, radical – far more radical than the leftist ideologies with which I had previously been enamored. The love of God was unlike anything which I expected, or of which I could make sense.

Read it all.

How Oxford and Peter Singer drove me from #atheism to #Jesus https://t.co/oba563jUXs pic.twitter.com/QMWp8Uxe0a

— The Poached Egg (@ThePoachedEgg) April 28, 2019

Holy Father, who hast nourished and strengthened thy Church by the writings of thy servant Thomas a Kempis: Grant that we may learn from him to know what we ought to know, to love what we ought to love, to praise what highly pleaseth thee, and always to seek to know and follow thy will; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

25 July 1451: d. Thomas à Kempis spiritual writer #otd whose Imitation of Christ had vast influence pic.twitter.com/2v7gYvksEi

— John McCafferty (@jdmccafferty) July 25, 2018

Grant, O Lord, that we may be diligent to read Thy Word, wherein is wisdom, wherein is the royal law, wherein are the lively oracles of God; and that reading it, we may daily increase in the knowledge of Thyself, and love and serve Thee with more perfect heart.

–Frederick B. Macnutt, The prayer manual for private devotions or public use on divers occasions: Compiled from all sources ancient, medieval, and modern (A.R. Mowbray, 1951)

Happy #Saturday
Cool #CrestCam #sunrise
Watch out for #storms #today
Live #weather now on KOAT 7!#SaturdayMorning #Mountainshttps://t.co/LJFHVytc3U#NMwx #NewMexico @koat7news pic.twitter.com/nx6MzdP0AH

— Byron Morton KOAT (@ByronKOAT) July 24, 2021

He went away from there and came to his own country; and his disciples followed him. And on the sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue; and many who heard him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get all this? What is the wisdom given to him? What mighty works are wrought by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house.” And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands upon a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief.

–Mark 6:1-6

Some early morning rain in #Pittsburgh left the skies a little cloudy today, which was perfect to create a colorful canvas for a beautiful scene just after sunrise. The varying layers of clouds all lit up different shades, with the sun peeking through the lights atop PNC Park. pic.twitter.com/fs3hqraSPe

— Dave DiCello (@DaveDiCello) July 24, 2021