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Good morning. Do you remember the telephone? We used to use it before life was taken over by video conferencing. Now if you don’t see someone on a screen you can’t be sure they’re really well – or really listening. But whether it’s idleness, anxiety, or love, we want to be in touch with friends and colleagues much more often. ‘Keep in touch’ we say – when we all know that touch is the one thing we can’t do. Touch becomes more precious, more vital, the more we can’t do it. The less we can touch physically, the more we yearn to touch virtually. The Easter story involves a lot of touch. Mary’s first reaction on seeing the risen Jesus is to touch him. Jesus invites doubting Thomas to touch his wounded hands and side. He says ‘Touch me and see’ to those who take him for a ghost. Touch becomes the way his followers know his resurrection is real. Long before the virus, touch had been among the most controversial things in contemporary society. How many disputes in workplace or home are about when and how to touch, and when not to touch? Touch is electric; infectious; can be unwelcome, or coercive; yet can be healing, and transformative. Earlier in his ministry, Jesus felt power go out of him when a woman who’d suffered for twelve years from continuous bleeding came up behind him and touched the hem of his garment. It’s a powerful story about touch, because it reverses our usual fears. You’d expect her malady somehow to jeopardise Jesus. But it turns out the other way round. Jesus’ grace proves more infectious than her infirmity. And that’s the challenge our whole society – indeed our whole world – faces today: to imagine something more infectious than the virus. We’ve become disciplined in distancing and isolation. We understand the danger of touch. But to come out of this crisis stronger than we went into it can’t be simply about things we passively refrain from doing. In the inspirational work of medical teams, in the simple kindness of neighbours and volunteers, we’re seeing something more infectious than the virus, a spirit of generosity, unselfishness, true care and tangible love: something that, however isolated we have to be, somehow binds us together like seldom before. It’s very… touching. We’re discovering ways to touch each other’s lives that don’t involve physical touch; gestures of thoughtfulness, attention, and gentleness that don’t put one another in danger. It’s a phenomenon more contagious than Covid-19 – which I pray will outlive and outlast it. Amid the crucifixion of death, disease and debt, we’re seeing something else. A kind of resurrection – an upsurge of disarming, touching goodness.