Compassion and charity
One of the themes of the book I'm reading with that Creighton group, How Big Is Your God? by Paul Coutinho SJ, is the difference the author sees between charity and compassion. He believes that when a person practices charity, they are in control of the situation, can pick and choose when to help, who to help, how much help to give, how much that help will cost them, but when a person is being compassionate, they do not consciously decide to act, they have no control, they are sucked into the situation on an emotional and unconditional level, there's no limit imposed on how much help is given, and they don't count the cost.
When I read this, the thought occurred to me that Jesus' response to those in need is one of the best examples of such compassionate engagement. That reminded me of a homily by Rob Marsh SJ in which Jesus raises the dead son of the widow of Nain, provoked by splagchnizomai. Here's part of Fr. Marsh's homily ....
****************************
Thursday Week 24 Year I
[...] To know how Jesus chose you only have to take a look at a word at the heart of today’s gospel—it appears here buried under the weak translation, ‘Jesus felt sorry’. ‘Felt sorry’. Some translators say ‘pity’ and others ‘compassion’ and in some places it’s ‘anger’. It’s an awkward Greek word with the sense of what you feel in your spleen. Jesus feels sorry for the woman—but powerfully, passionately… something convulses his bowels, turns his stomach over—that’s why he puts out his hand and brings a corpse to life.
Luke uses the word in only two other places: he uses it when the prodigal Father can’t help but rush down the road to meet his returning son; and he uses it in the story of the Good Samaritan, where the wrong person is stirred up to do the right thing.
Three events. Three characters who can’t help but act because they have experienced something so powerfully it grabs them in their guts. They experience the need, the pain, the joy, the life, of another human being and feel it like their own—in their innards. It takes a particular kind of weakness to let that happen. A real vulnerability. You don’t learn that vulnerability from a distance. You only learn it through your own pain, your own need, maybe only through failure … when our natural insulation one from another can no longer cope and the barriers go down ......
*********************
I feel more comfortable with charity than compassion. It's not that I don't feel compassion (I think), but it calls for involvement and actually sort of hurts (me, anyway). I give money instead, hoping charities will care, so I don't have to. But sometimes the bowel-churning trumps caution - that's how I ended up with my four cats :)
When I read this, the thought occurred to me that Jesus' response to those in need is one of the best examples of such compassionate engagement. That reminded me of a homily by Rob Marsh SJ in which Jesus raises the dead son of the widow of Nain, provoked by splagchnizomai. Here's part of Fr. Marsh's homily ....
****************************
Thursday Week 24 Year I
[...] To know how Jesus chose you only have to take a look at a word at the heart of today’s gospel—it appears here buried under the weak translation, ‘Jesus felt sorry’. ‘Felt sorry’. Some translators say ‘pity’ and others ‘compassion’ and in some places it’s ‘anger’. It’s an awkward Greek word with the sense of what you feel in your spleen. Jesus feels sorry for the woman—but powerfully, passionately… something convulses his bowels, turns his stomach over—that’s why he puts out his hand and brings a corpse to life.
Luke uses the word in only two other places: he uses it when the prodigal Father can’t help but rush down the road to meet his returning son; and he uses it in the story of the Good Samaritan, where the wrong person is stirred up to do the right thing.
Three events. Three characters who can’t help but act because they have experienced something so powerfully it grabs them in their guts. They experience the need, the pain, the joy, the life, of another human being and feel it like their own—in their innards. It takes a particular kind of weakness to let that happen. A real vulnerability. You don’t learn that vulnerability from a distance. You only learn it through your own pain, your own need, maybe only through failure … when our natural insulation one from another can no longer cope and the barriers go down ......
*********************
I feel more comfortable with charity than compassion. It's not that I don't feel compassion (I think), but it calls for involvement and actually sort of hurts (me, anyway). I give money instead, hoping charities will care, so I don't have to. But sometimes the bowel-churning trumps caution - that's how I ended up with my four cats :)
posted by crystal | 11:07 AM
2 Comments:
In more than one medieval text I have run across a phrase that could best be translated as "the merciful bowels of Jesus." I guess this is where it comes from. The medievals were much more in touch with their bodies than we, poor post-Cartisian post-Victorian moderns are.
The thing to remember, of course, is that the word charity (caritas) really just means "love."
Hi Liam,
Yeah, I think the Greeks thought the liver was the source of emotions ..... maybe that's why the eagle was eating Prometheus' liver.
About charity = love, it reminds me of that discussion earlier about whether love is an emotion or a decision. Charity seems like love as a decision.
Post a Comment
<< Home