In continuing reflection on truth and the Pandemic, I feel the need to simply state that the further away we move from truth, the greater the threat of the Pandemic. At the same time, it's important to realize that arriving at the truth of anything is a process that leads us to seeing layers or perspectives of reality. We put boundaries around reality--"what is"--so that we can limit the parameters of our search for understanding. We aim for the essential pieces to master them them, but none of us hold the Allness in our knowledge. This is the root of conflict between science and spirituality. Scientific facts are pursued in pieces that can be carefully tested and measured. In science, and particularly in medicine, we are trained in objectivity, to experience the object being studied, whether a virus or an ill human being, from the outsider point of view, separate from ourselves as the observer, the clinician, the researcher.
Spirituality, on the other hand, pulls us to be aware that we are not standing outside at all; what is seemingly out there, is happening within the larger whole that we are. The more we try to grasp understanding the more it eludes us. But in stillness and quiet affirmation, it finds us at a level that is specific to us and our need.
We come to realize that our view is partial, that the whole view would have to include the partial view of everyone else, but that is not possible as an individual. So we make our peace with the process of truth, that leads us to this seeing of layers. We learn to trust the value of truth, even though the whole of truth is beyond us. One of the layers is Scientific truth, the facts of studied components of life. It has great importance in a Pandemic, even though it is not the whole of truth. Legal truth is yet another aspect or layer; it has its place in social order. So humanly, truth becomes an array of partial yet meaningful truths, the key word being "meaningful".
When truth is just understood as partial, it can open the door to justification of dismissal, half truths, polarization and outright fabrication that leads to cynicism. Cynicism erodes trust as well as faith in life's goodness, beauty, intelligence and renewing, healing capacity. But when truth is affirmed as meaningful, even though partial, our definitions of scientific truth, legal truth, and ethical truth give our world stability. Spiritually, we can see these collective movements of society, striving for greater truth, as yet another layer of the Real, the Whole, the All. (Susan Nettleton)