The plot is silly, at times preposterous. But that’s not unexpected for an old-fashioned popcorn movie, a Saturday-matinee serial writ large.

Churches will ring bells at noon Dec. 30, to remember and honor the more than 336,000 people who have died in the United States from COVID-19.

Jesuit Father George Restrepo, who served more than three decades at the Shrine of the Little Flower in Northeast Baltimore and later at St. Thomas Aquinas in Hampden, died the day after his 87th birthday Dec. 20 at the Murray-Weigel Jesuit Community in the Bronx.

The Vatican’s coronavirus commission and the Pontifical Academy for Life issued a joint statement calling for a coordinated international effort to ensure the equitable distribution of COVID-19 vaccines worldwide.

Thank you for today, God, and for tomorrow – the days ahead we have yet to unwrap and discover.