Crediting nothing to God, a politician boasted, “Our behavior stopped the spread of the virus. God did not stop the spread of the virus and what we do, how we act, will dictate how the virus spreads.” That’s the governor of New York swaggering like Herod.

Governor Cuomo claimed all the power to lock us down, but expects the American taxpayer to bail him out. Would he have closed down NYC if the virus hot spot was rural western NY?

Besides, did the governor’s one-size-fits-all lockdown stop the spread or just delay it? Was it based on science and real data or driven by faulty modeling data, shoddy assumptions, panic, and an opportunistic power grab?

Cuomo prohibits a “non-essential” pool guy from opening outdoor pools as his taxes assist the governor’s “essential” green energy workers currently making needless wind turbines in our county.

Over 40 days it took him to reverse his mystifying order mandating nursing homes to take in COVID-positive patients. The remaining body bags sent along with the original order still send a not so subtle message of “non-essential” to the elderly.

Stuck on PAUSE, our governor considers Chautauqua county which has 7 active cases as high risk as Erie county which has 3,100 active cases. Despite the disparity, our governor keeps our county shut down.

We are in what Dennis Prager calls “clarifying times.” Prager, as an orthodox Jew no less, wishes the gospel of the Bible was venerated as much as the current gospel of modified house-arrest.

Banning people from driving to their second home, Michigan’s governor Gretchen Whitmer, a potential VP of Joe Biden, also prohibited motorized boats from launching. Roping off “non-essential sections” in stores, she stopped the sale of grass seed and paint, but liquor sales, “weed” and lottery tickets remained essential. Reason deserts power-obsessed executives arbitrarily handpicking “essential” jobs and commodities. Governors, like her and ours, have you so focused on having the virus quarantined that they deflect you from seeing how they quarantine the Constitution.

Governor Phil Murphy of New Jersey never gave the Constitution a thought in prohibiting churches from assembling. Rights appear non-essential to him. The right to assemble and the application of wisdom are not mutually exclusive. Christians seek God for wisdom to act on behalf of those vulnerable to the virus and those harmed by the shutdown.

Elites puff up knowledge and credentials. Experts with doctorates have no more inherent wisdom than those with trade school degrees. With artificial intelligence surging into society, you won’t find artificial wisdom anywhere. Expertise is no substitute for wisdom. In the pursuit of knowledge, the Bible says, “Get wisdom.” These are clarifying times.

You’re subject to “virus-shaming” for even suggesting Americans gradually return to work. Until recently, your cancer screening had to wait, but killing unborn children couldn’t wait.

After this shutdown has set a precedent, how much easier it will be for leftists in power to close us down over climate change. The environmental goal of the radical Left seeks to move people out of the countryside and herd them into cities. Ironically, the virus has made life in the country better off than in the city. We need herd immunity against tyranny, not just the virus.

The Left promises temporary comfort, hand-outs, government-controlled security, and “safe spaces” at the expense of essential liberty which requires bravery, risk and personal responsibility.

“The land of the free and the home of the brave” feels like the land gripped with fear and the home for the safe. A caller to the Prager show said that the country should open “when it’s safe.” I ask, “When’s that? Is it when Ezekiel Emmanuel, a Biden health adviser, says, “12-18 months?” On the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrims crossing the Atlantic, they thankfully didn’t say, “We’ll cross when it’s safe.”

The onset of the virus has thrust us into clarifying times. The Left and liberty cannot co-exist. One will succumb to the other. Like Prager remarks, “Give me liberty or give me death” has in our day become “Give me liberty or give me the Left.”

The Rev. Mel McGinnis is a Frewsburg resident.