At a recent StBs Darfur prayer meeting, we discussed an article written by Bryant Myers (Author of Walking with the Poor) called "Compassion with an Attitude: a Humanitarian's View of Human Suffering." It has a lot of relevance for us at St. Brendan's as we seek ways to engage with those who are suffering both in our city and abroad. He defines compassion and suggest the marks of engage church.
Compassion with an Attitude Defined...
He defines compassion on three levels:
1. "Compassion begins with seeing the suffering of others and being willing to listen to its call. If we are willing to see and to hear, we must next be willing to feel. The first part of being truly and incarnationally compassionate is to be moved to the core of our being with pity and outrage when in the presence of human suffering.
2. "To hear, see, and feel is the foundation of compassion. Yet it is not compassion itself. In its fullest sense, compassion is an action word. Driven by conviction and mercy, we must act..."
3. "Compassion actions that Jesus took were not just ameliorative. Compassion is more than mercy and more than simple response. Biblical compassion has a bias in favor of social restoration.. (ie. showing compassion to refugees but also unmasking the human greed and hunger for power that created the conflict from which refugees flee)
**In its fullest form, compassion is seeing, feeling and acting in a way that poses a radical critique of the dominant voices of the day, reminding them of what God in fact requires of them.**
Bryant Myers goes on to describe the marks of an engaged church that has embraced "incarnational empathy":
1. Sacrificial Giving - "a Good Samaritan kind of giving, the kind of giving that inconveniences us and sacrifices the daily schedule, the kind of giving that not only gets a suffering man to an inn but leaves money with the innkeeper."
2. Social Restorative Actions - "this is associated wiht the attitude aspect of compassion. This is the mark that comes from making noise in polite and powerful places, the kind of mark that comes from taking positions that are unpopular and provactive" (similar to our discussion on the retreat about addressing structural injustices)
3. Prayer - not just for the relief of suffering but to reveal a loving, active God who suffers with us and whose Glory can be revealed even in the face of suffering.
How does this relate to Darfur and St. Brendan's? I am still figuring that out but I know that we can prayer for God and His Glory to be revealed even in the midst of the mess of Sudan and that Jesus' model of what compassion looks like is a challenge.
Some food for thought....
Jen
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1 comment:
Your first point -- the importance of letting ourselves feel -- reminds me of a verse I read in Job yesterday. Job, defending himself and insisting on his righteousness, says: "Did I not weep for those whose day was hard? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?" (Job 30:25)
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