Compassion
Compassion. Haven't thought about it much, as a concept, since being in outreach situations with Mercy Ships. In that world i heard it mused over by fellow travelers both wiser and more experienced in it than i. But when the need is suddenly on your own soil, strong opinions form a lot more quickly. And the discussion, more or less, was this: What happens when compassion meets ingratitude?
Certainly it spotlights your definition of compassion. Like love, really. If it's kind of a vague warm feeling of desire to give to others out of pity for their circumstances - well, that evaporates pretty quickly the first time someone fails to respond to your gift the way you think they should. I find that such a motivation actually makes me more and more demanding, perversely, as a giver. (As all our self-centered imitations of virtue do, really, which is a good way to gauge how you're doing in any given area.) But if compassion to you is a practice, a way of doing and acting that you cultivate in yourself regardless of its reception outside - then that's a real start.
Henri Nouwen wrote a fine, fine book on the subject, which i read several years ago and of which i remember nothing at all. But today's news footage brought it to mind again. In New Orleans last night, the police were forced to stop rescuing stranded citizens because the mayor needed them to fight armed gangs of looters running wild. This morning, military Chinook helicopters evacuating refugees from the Superdome had to stop after a shot was fired up at one of them. Reportedly, a servicemember was wounded. In another area of the city, dozens of volunteers who had driven in from far away to bring their small boats for the rescue efforts were forced to sit idle because they were shot at while trying to pull people from the water.
Is this really upsetting to anyone else? It is to me. Apparently some of those small-boat volunteers had some choice words on the subject this morning, as did a few of the cops (who, it's worth noting, face that kind of routine depravity every day). Characteristically, today it was the military professionals that responded with the most grace and restraint. When someone asked the captain of the just-arrived Navy vessel USS Bataan how he felt about his fellow rescuers being shot at by the very people they were trying to save, he spoke gently, using words like "understandable desperation." If i'd been in this place, i'm not sure such a charitable response would have been the first thing out of my mouth.
Yet, faced with such an appalling response to their rescue efforts, the women and men of the Red Cross, NOPD, Army, Navy, Coast Guard, National Guard, FEMA, and others are responding in turn by continuing their efforts. This, simply, is grace. Met with demands, hostility, and worse, they are continuing to practice compassion. Now, it's one thing to go through the motions on the outside even if you're seething within, but it is something. It's a very big something. And i guess the inside, for all of us, is the perpetual next step.
Anyway, read the book. Or, for that matter, the original book. They put it much better.
Certainly it spotlights your definition of compassion. Like love, really. If it's kind of a vague warm feeling of desire to give to others out of pity for their circumstances - well, that evaporates pretty quickly the first time someone fails to respond to your gift the way you think they should. I find that such a motivation actually makes me more and more demanding, perversely, as a giver. (As all our self-centered imitations of virtue do, really, which is a good way to gauge how you're doing in any given area.) But if compassion to you is a practice, a way of doing and acting that you cultivate in yourself regardless of its reception outside - then that's a real start.
Henri Nouwen wrote a fine, fine book on the subject, which i read several years ago and of which i remember nothing at all. But today's news footage brought it to mind again. In New Orleans last night, the police were forced to stop rescuing stranded citizens because the mayor needed them to fight armed gangs of looters running wild. This morning, military Chinook helicopters evacuating refugees from the Superdome had to stop after a shot was fired up at one of them. Reportedly, a servicemember was wounded. In another area of the city, dozens of volunteers who had driven in from far away to bring their small boats for the rescue efforts were forced to sit idle because they were shot at while trying to pull people from the water.
Is this really upsetting to anyone else? It is to me. Apparently some of those small-boat volunteers had some choice words on the subject this morning, as did a few of the cops (who, it's worth noting, face that kind of routine depravity every day). Characteristically, today it was the military professionals that responded with the most grace and restraint. When someone asked the captain of the just-arrived Navy vessel USS Bataan how he felt about his fellow rescuers being shot at by the very people they were trying to save, he spoke gently, using words like "understandable desperation." If i'd been in this place, i'm not sure such a charitable response would have been the first thing out of my mouth.
Yet, faced with such an appalling response to their rescue efforts, the women and men of the Red Cross, NOPD, Army, Navy, Coast Guard, National Guard, FEMA, and others are responding in turn by continuing their efforts. This, simply, is grace. Met with demands, hostility, and worse, they are continuing to practice compassion. Now, it's one thing to go through the motions on the outside even if you're seething within, but it is something. It's a very big something. And i guess the inside, for all of us, is the perpetual next step.
Anyway, read the book. Or, for that matter, the original book. They put it much better.
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