It's all about compassion
Isaiah 58:7-10
Thich Nhat Hanh writes again and again that if one wants to be happy--by which he means settled, at peace, and content--then one needs to practice compassion--for others, for oneself, and for the world. This Vietnamese Buddhist master may well be meditating on the words of the Hebrew prophet Isaiah, who, in this oracle, makes it painfully clear and inescapable that the practice of compassion is the only way into shalom--the perfect peace of God.
Do they have a point?
Irrefutably.
Compassion opens us first to the wonder of other human beings. It gives them faces, names, and an inescapable reality. We cannot simply pass by another person as if they were part of the landscape--some living, breathing chunk of furniture placed along the road--they are real with a story to tell.
One of the best songs the Grateful Dead, those icons of hippie-dom, ever sang was "Wharf Rat," in which a young, broke hipster can't give the Rat a dime for a cup of coffee, but takes time to listen to his story. God seeks for us to listen to the stories all around us--to LISTEN, not just HEAR--to engage with the storyteller--in order to care.
To care will often mean intervening--i.e., responding to the person before us with what they need, be it a blanket, a meal, an ear, an open heart, a shoulder, etc. That means getting involved.
Oh, no...
Involvement is anathema to our time.
But it is also our hope.
I was struck by an article in the Washington Post about a lawsuit between a neighborhood association and tenant couple ("Feud over Sign," Justin Jouvenal, 2/6/13). The article wove the story of a couple who planted a campaign sign in their front yard that was a few inches bigger than allowed--inches, mind you. The association attempted to thwart their advertisement, but the couple sued for free speech, and the suit bankrupted the association, and now the neighborhood is in uproar. I have long believed that neighborhood associations exist because neighbors do not know one another, therefore, do not trust one another, and, alas, feel the only way to ensure order is to regulate one another. Right. That gets us here in this story.
What if they had loved one another?
I grew up in neighborhoods marked by neighbors--real people who knew each other. A neighborhood association would have driven itself to apoplexy over the eccentricities of the people who shared our street. There was the Franciscan friar who converted his sister's yard into a tangled, wondrous, beautiful garden of herbs, flowers, vines, trees, and shrubs that grew all over one another in a verdant chaos of riotous plants. There was the next door neighbor who did not seem to own a lawnmower, never wanted one, and let the grass be free to be grass. There was the guy down the street whose Dobermans were loose all the time, but so sweet, they were like furry candy. Kids avoided the street by cutting through side yards, backyards, and driveways with nary a reprimand from anyone. There was the A-Type who appeared to mow the lawn with surgical shears, every blade precisely 2.5 centimeters tall. There was the family who had ten kids, two boats, and a used car lot in the driveway. We all got along. We knew each other. We loved each other. We fussed, fumed, and raged from time to time, but we were neighbors all the time.
We lived in peace.
No lawsuits.
That is what Isaiah wants us to be, for that is what God wants us to be.
Thich Nhat Hanh writes again and again that if one wants to be happy--by which he means settled, at peace, and content--then one needs to practice compassion--for others, for oneself, and for the world. This Vietnamese Buddhist master may well be meditating on the words of the Hebrew prophet Isaiah, who, in this oracle, makes it painfully clear and inescapable that the practice of compassion is the only way into shalom--the perfect peace of God.
Do they have a point?
Irrefutably.
Compassion opens us first to the wonder of other human beings. It gives them faces, names, and an inescapable reality. We cannot simply pass by another person as if they were part of the landscape--some living, breathing chunk of furniture placed along the road--they are real with a story to tell.
One of the best songs the Grateful Dead, those icons of hippie-dom, ever sang was "Wharf Rat," in which a young, broke hipster can't give the Rat a dime for a cup of coffee, but takes time to listen to his story. God seeks for us to listen to the stories all around us--to LISTEN, not just HEAR--to engage with the storyteller--in order to care.
To care will often mean intervening--i.e., responding to the person before us with what they need, be it a blanket, a meal, an ear, an open heart, a shoulder, etc. That means getting involved.
Oh, no...
Involvement is anathema to our time.
But it is also our hope.
I was struck by an article in the Washington Post about a lawsuit between a neighborhood association and tenant couple ("Feud over Sign," Justin Jouvenal, 2/6/13). The article wove the story of a couple who planted a campaign sign in their front yard that was a few inches bigger than allowed--inches, mind you. The association attempted to thwart their advertisement, but the couple sued for free speech, and the suit bankrupted the association, and now the neighborhood is in uproar. I have long believed that neighborhood associations exist because neighbors do not know one another, therefore, do not trust one another, and, alas, feel the only way to ensure order is to regulate one another. Right. That gets us here in this story.
What if they had loved one another?
I grew up in neighborhoods marked by neighbors--real people who knew each other. A neighborhood association would have driven itself to apoplexy over the eccentricities of the people who shared our street. There was the Franciscan friar who converted his sister's yard into a tangled, wondrous, beautiful garden of herbs, flowers, vines, trees, and shrubs that grew all over one another in a verdant chaos of riotous plants. There was the next door neighbor who did not seem to own a lawnmower, never wanted one, and let the grass be free to be grass. There was the guy down the street whose Dobermans were loose all the time, but so sweet, they were like furry candy. Kids avoided the street by cutting through side yards, backyards, and driveways with nary a reprimand from anyone. There was the A-Type who appeared to mow the lawn with surgical shears, every blade precisely 2.5 centimeters tall. There was the family who had ten kids, two boats, and a used car lot in the driveway. We all got along. We knew each other. We loved each other. We fussed, fumed, and raged from time to time, but we were neighbors all the time.
We lived in peace.
No lawsuits.
That is what Isaiah wants us to be, for that is what God wants us to be.
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