New tiered restrictions come into effect in England today, amid calls from one side for tighter restrictions, and another for relaxed restrictions. Scotland has been promised a tiered approach later in the month, with perhaps a fourth tier. Northern Ireland will be announcing new restrictions today, and Wales has threatened to close the border to folk from higher tier areas of England. What a cheerful outlook as we move into colder, wetter, darker weather! What will we do? Will we go and sit in the corner and mope our way through to the Spring? Or will we say, ‘I’m not letting this get me down!’ Can we make plans for ourselves for ways to keep occupied through restrictions: new projects, interests, hobbies? We will all have ‘wobbles’, so we need the support of each other. We need people to be there for us, to phone up, chat, cheer us up, offer to help in some way. But we also need to be ready to do that for others, to listen to their moans, to try to cheer them up, to encourage them to find something positive to do. If we have spare time after all that, there are plenty of charities and volunteer groups looking for assistance too
Lord, there are times when it is hard to cope with living with restrictions. That’s when we particularly need the help of other people. Thank you for that assistance and support. Help us too to be the assistance and support that other people need. Now especially we need to work together as a community to support each other – help us to focus on that, rather than us all drifting into thinking only of ourselves
