Compassion in Response to Violence (Mark 9: 30-37)

September is a significant month for several reasons. This past week we remembered the coordinated terrorist attacks against the United States of America on the 11th of September, 2001. Then on Sunday the 19th of September, the Anglican Communion has Battle of Britain Sunday, to remember the largest and most concentrated attack launched by the Luftwaffe against London on the15th September, 1940. In New Zealand, we also remember Suffrage Day on that same Sunday because we became the first self-governing country where women could vote in parliamentary elections. While we may take that particular battle for equality for granted, we do so in the context of what is unfolding for the women in Afghanistan. They face rising levels of domestic violence, abuse and exploitation under Taliban control.

Violence also forms the backdrop for the Gospel reading this Sunday (Mark 9: 30-37). Jesus contemplates the inevitability of his torture and death because he dared to challenge the religious and State powers for the violence and atrocities they were committing against anyone who challenged them. However, Jesus never returned fear with fear or violence with violence. Instead, he taught a way of personal and social transformation through the practice of radical compassion. Frank Rogers gives us a contemporary and practical illustration of this way of responding in his book, 'Practicing Compassion in a Violent World'.1 Compassion, he says, has a two-way interaction. 

 

“It not only restores the heart of our own humanity

 – its healing care restores the heart of another that has grown hard and cold”

 

To illustrate this, Rogers recounts a story about a man whose wife of 45 years died suddenly in her sleep. The man was grief-stricken. He finally decided he needed to do something. Because his wife loved roses, he would plant a beautiful memorial rose garden in front of his house. You can imagine his horror when he discovered someone had vandalised several of the rose bushes. So he kept watch, and several days later, he saw a local boy from a neighbouring gang stop and slashed another rose bush with a stick. Instinctively the man wanted to return the boy's violence with violence. Then, he realised he had a choice. He knew the family and knew the boy had a bleak future. He could report him to the police – but he decided instead to do something radically proactive. The next time the boy passed, he went out and asked him for his help. He needed someone to keep watch over his roses because someone was damaging them. He also needed help with his vegetable garden and was willing to pay the boy for his time.

The boy did come back, and the damage to the rose bushes stopped. The lad also provided valuable help and companionship for the man. When he was a little older, he started an inner-city youth programme to provide an alternative to gang life.

To do something radically proactive in the face of violence requires courage. It is also a spiritual path. One that begins when we know we are held, healed and empowered by the sacred presence of God's Compassion, irrespective of our failures and imperfections. Choosing to live a compassionate way of life will provide meaning and purpose to our lives. It begins when we allow God's love to flow through us in some practical and proactive way. We will also find ourselves participating in God's healing presence in our world. And the Gospel reading for this Sunday demonstrates this principle in action.

Jesus warned his disciples his life was in danger. Their response was one of fear. What would happen to them? They had left everything to follow him. However, they were afraid to voice those fears to Jesus, so they turned inward and argued with one another. Jesus never told them off or criticised them. He sat down and talked to them about their fears and concerns for the future. Then to illustrate his meaning he pointed to a child playing nearby and said: “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” Or, to quote a similar Sufi saying:

When the mystery of God is revealed to you,

you will understand that God has always been in you....

Then you will see all your actions to be His actions

and your essence to be His essence....

There is nothing except His Face, and "whithersoever you turn,

there you will see the Face of God."

Kia mau te rongo me te pai ki a koe i to haerenga

May you find peace and good will on your journey.

Phil

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1Frank Rogers, Jr. Compassion in Practice: The Way of Jesus,‎ Upper Room Books, 2016 Frank Rogers is Professor of Spiritual Formation and Narrative Pedagogy and the co-director of the Center for Engaged Compassion. His teaching focuses on spiritual formation that is contemplative, creative, and socially liberative.