"'Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.' The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore [Isaiah 2: 2-4 NIV]."
From India to Israel, Italy to Hungary, over the last 15 years I've enjoyed, and cherished, the opportunity experiencing the richness of diverse ethnic, and religious, traditions. A learning process to be sure. People living thousands-of-kilometers away from one another share a multitude of differences …. significant differences. History — Language — Cultural Traditions. Climate — Environment — Landscape. And with such diversity — so much distinct diversity — immersion in any one of these countries [ .. or in any one of hundreds of other unfamiliar locations … from Africa, to Asia, to South America, to Australia] — whether as a stranger, visitor, or 'foreign national' …. requires adjustment … and education. A learning process …. again, and again, and again: discovering where we share commonality and where we share differences, where we find understanding and where we encounter disagreement (and sometimes confusion), where we uncover despair, or suffering …. and where we seek solutions — that heal. Where we speak as one voice - in harmony and agreement: and where we listen, and hear, with open minds — seeking dialogue and relationship.
Relationship, dialogue — so central …. to so much of our daily life. Whether family or community, institutions or governments, our success in 'interacting with others' — in meaningful, constructive, and caring ways — requires building, and opening, an inclusive, trusting, caring relationship where our intent is on creating understanding, and deepening communication ….and not on manipulation, control, possession, or dominance.
Anyone who has experienced a caring hand during a time of suffering or tragedy in their life knows the tremendous gift of a compassionate relationship — a relationship that seeks to bring comfort, and healing, to a person (or group or family) … living in loneliness or despair, fear or isolation, pain or suffering. In this 'embracing environment', where "we can see beyond the narrow confines of cultural differences", we find the example, the model, the pattern for compassionate relationships. From this healing space we can meet the stranger, the broken, the wounded, 'the other'. In this caring, 'holistic' environment — where we speak as one voice, sharing our 'wounded togetherness' — we can "help people to recognize the work of God in themselves."1
What does it mean to be a healer in the modern world? How do we cultivate a relationship that responds completely — unrestrained — with care, compassion, concern …. for one another?
In The Wounded Healer, Henri Nouwen talks about 'pastoral conversation' as a means of encounter with people who face fear, uncertainty, rejection, isolation. Henri Nouwen saw, and experienced in his life — a life lived as a Catholic priest — the condition of a suffering world, the condition of a suffering generation, the condition of a suffering man, the condition of a suffering minister. Within this suffering, infectious condition, he saw the call to compassion, and healing …. a call he confronted by making his own wounds available as a source of healing.
If we search deeply into the soul of Nouwen's teachings — as the wounded healer — we discover that the framework for pastoral conversation — at the everyday level … within the hearts of parents, workers, teachers, caregivers — is simply relationship: sacrificial relationships that seek to provide "a deep human encounter in which a man [or woman] is willing to put his own faith and doubt, his own hope and despair, his own light and darkness at the disposal of others who want to find a way through their confusion and touch the solid core of life."2
Nouwen reminds us that "Compassion is born when we discover in the center of our own existence not only that God is God and man is man, but also that our neighbor is really our fellow man."3
"…Through compassion it is possible to recognize that the craving for love that men [women] feel resides also in our own hearts, that the cruelty that the world knows all too well is also rooted in our own impulses. Through compassion we also sense our hope for forgiveness in our friends' eyes or hatred in their bitter mouths. When they kill, we know that we could have done it; when they give life, we know that we can do the same. For a compassionate man [woman] nothing human is alien: no joy and no sorrow, no way of living and no way of dying."4
Our common humanity, which circumscribes all nations of the world, creates a universal bond … bringing 'another's experiences' — whether tragic or joyful — into our own individual, personal space. A space that we often protect with rigid barriers and closed doors; but also a space that is transparent to one another … because we share, together, the same emotional, and existential, foundation. We have all held — jointly, universally — the same experiences of fear, isolation, loneliness, despair, pain, suffering: building blocks of our broken humanity. And yet, these experiences, together with joy, love, happiness, fulfillment, satisfaction — when revealed to one another, in compassion — unite the man and the woman, the Hindu and the Buddhist, the Jew and the Muslim. Compassion provides the rope — the personal binding — that joins my human experience with another … with yours'. For it is through compassion that we see another's needs as a reflection of our own needs; their weaknesses as a parallel of my weaknesses; their failures as a projection of my failures. Compassion stands on the top of our human ladder … like a beacon of authority that directs the well-being behind relationship, interaction, encounter, and understanding.
"Compassion must become the core and even the nature of authority."5
" … compassion is authority because it does not tolerate the pressures of the in-group, but breaks through the boundaries between languages and countries, rich and poor, educated and illiterate. This compassion pulls people away from the fearful clique into the large world where they can see that every human face is the face of a neighbor."6
On a visit to India in November of 2006, I was invited to share in a meal — in dialog, and conversation — with three different families: one was Hindu, one Muslim, one Christian …. people whom I did not know personally [..with the exception of one family who I had met, briefly, two years earlier]. Remarkably — or so I thought at the time — these people opened their homes (almost as family) to meet 'another' — a small group of foreigners, strangers — in an atmosphere of hospitality, and compassion, and relationship. It was an experience that revealed more about similarities …. than differences. And it was our similarities — as human beings ... in reaching-out to one another in friendship, love, understanding …that had the greatest impact, and deepest memory.
Although the words and wisdom of Henri Nouwen speak from the heart of his own experiences, I can share [equally] in the truth and beauty of his teachings — simply, because I have known and witnessed, personally, "the heart of compassion" …found in those unforgettable, humble, caring encounters …. faced with others in my own life. Not only with the Hindu family, and the Muslim family, and the Christian family … in India; but also with the many Jewish families that I have come to know, and love, in Canada. And with people who do not share a faith community at all. All of these individuals — though different and diverse in many ways — are windows that allow me, and others, to see "that every human face is the face of a neighbor."
* * * * *
Jean Vanier, in his book encountering 'the other' retells the courageous story of Etty Hillesum — a victim of the Holocaust …. and a survivor. A survivor in God's House — an eternal soul that lives above, and beyond, the horrors of the Nazi regime.
"One of the women who has most influenced me is a young Jewish woman, Etty Hillesum, who died at Auschwitz in November 1943 at the age of twenty-nine. Once she was yelled at by a young Gestapo officer. She wrote in her journal: 'I felt no indignation, rather a real compassion and would like to ask: "Did you have a very unhappy childhood, has your girlfriend let you down?'" She was not fearful. She also had a deep sense of who the human person is. What makes a human person the sacred reality that the person is? Her deepest belief was that each person is a 'house' where God resides. At one moment she said, 'Everyone must be turned into a dwelling dedicated to you. I shall try to find a dwelling place and a refuge for you in as many houses as possible. There are so many empty houses. I shall prepare them all for You, the most honoured guest.' She had a deep sense of the beauty of each person; she felt that each one was carrying the mystery of God in a capacity to be, to love and to be loved."7
In the face of one another ... in the relationship that binds 'brother to brother', and 'sister to sister' …in the acceptance of diversity …and in the poverty of suffering: in each of these instances we are given the opportunity to change 'swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks'. Every occasion where we encounter the beauty of another person — where we sense 'the mystery of God in a capacity to be, to love and to be loved' — becomes an opportunity to create harmony, and relationship, with people for whom we share differences …. differences, in understanding.
Within each life lives the spark of our Creator — a hidden flame that longs to diminish, and consume, the darkness of the human self. A divine Light that reveals we are all one people — God's people ..... caing, compassionate human beings waiting to be born in the likeness of the Eternal.
* * * * *
In this century, on this planet, each of us holds the key to become wounded healers … men, women [and children] who — as a collective, fragile humanity — can choose to accept, and embrace, our brokenness as a part of the healing mosaic within a global community. "Community arises where the sharing of pain takes place, not as a stifling form of self-complaint, but as a recognition of God's saving promises ….not because our wounds are cured and pains are alleviated, but because wounds and pains become openings or occasions for a new vision […a new relationship]."8
In this new millennium, our call is to rediscover our need to heal one another … beginning, with our own wounds, our individual brokenness. Our challenge, in turn, is to recognize that our differences do not have to isolate us — but rather, diversity becomes the doorway to observe our common frailty ….so that from our wounded condition, we can explore the healing strength that flows from a heart of love.
"By seeing beyond the narrow confines of cultural differences and historic enmities, spiritual leaders from the world's great religions are blessed with a unique opportunity to apply their combined wisdom and influence to meet the challenges of our day and to bequeath to future generations a globalized perspective that draws the very best of our collective spiritual and religious heritage. I can think of no greater goal in the twenty-first century than ushering in the era predicted by the Old Testament prophet Isaiah: when nations 'will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore' [Isaiah 2:4 NIV]."9
In compassion, we can find the courage to heal the scars that divide us.
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- Nouwen, Henri J.M. The Wounded Healer. New York: Doubleday, 1979.
- ibid.
- ibid.
- ibid.
- ibid.
- ibid.
- Vanier, Jean. encountering 'the other'. Dublin: Veritas, 2005.
- Nouwen, Henri J.M. The Wounded Healer. New York: Doubleday, 1979.
- Rauf, Imam Feisal Abdul. What's Right With Islam: A New Vision for Muslims and the West. New York: Harper Collins, 2004.