"The Call To Compassion”
Rev. LeRoy Zemke, Pastor

Buddhism
"Compassion is no attribute. It is the Law of Laws ... a shoreless universal essence, the light of everlasting right and fitness of all things, the law of love eternal".
The Seven Portals

Christianity
"When (Jesus) saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion because they ... were... as sheep having no shepherd."
Bible - Matthew 9:36

Judaism
"He who has compassion upon others receives compassion from Heaven.
Talmud, Shabbat 151

Compassion: A feeling of deep sympathy for the misfortune of others and the accompanying desire to alleviate suffering.

When compassion emerges out of an awakening consciousness, it reaches into the very fabric of another soul. Not only is there evidence of sympathy, but empathy; a capacity to understand at some very deep level of our inner nature what suffering, hurt, pain, loss, wounding may be occurring for another being, group, nation, race or culture.

At a societal level, we are often called to witness tragedies and losses of incredible diversity and complexity such as wars between groups, nations and ethnic communities. We can bear witness to fire as it destroys a single home or sweeps across an entire community, or area of a state or entire city. When earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, floods and other "acts of God" touch human life with unimaginable destruction and loss, we see before our naked eyes the physical circumstances that precipitate scenes of tremendous, truly overwhelming loss.

After the news elements are reported and reviewed over and over again, we intellectually have a sense that we comprehend what's taking place. We begin to learn the facts, the numbers, the "hard" data, but all it reveals is information. Can we deeply, consciously, understand, empathize or truly sympathize what it might possiblymean to observe the effects of a flood as an entire community is inundated, or a tornado sweeping a town or city somewhat like a cosmic broom of all its residents, its industry, its life force in people and plants, animals and birds?

What are the "degrees' of compassion that life asks of us? Is such even remotely possible?

As we awaken, especially to the multilayered dimensionality of our soul, and to that which exists within us (beyond any known capacities or capabilities) love expressed in a compassionate fashion is the hallmark of service to life. When we express love to family, siblings, children ... to our spouses and to partners, we share the personal, human side of love. Elements of the sacred are contained in any act of genuine love. When we express compassion we take our more personal components of love and extend those qualities in a gradually more unconditional way. We learn to express agape love toward a friend, acquaintance or stranger. We open into a new expression of love's essence.

When we offer unconditional love to another human being (often called a stranger), because he/she is in need, i.e. has no food, or place to stay, is ill or so weak that he/she can not help himself, we step into compassion.

Compassion is stirred often when we see a national tragedy in our own country or elsewhere in the world. Families whose homes have been ravaged by flood, earthquake or severe conditions of climate or the elements or an act of destruction such as a bomb explosion, warfare between nations or refugees escaping a repressive regime often invite us to find way to help alleviate the misery, the suffering we witness in a meaningful act of loving service. If such service arises out of guilt, or because we feel magnanimous (we have so much more than those who do not) we may genuinely give time, effort and money generously to a cause -but such is usually not an act of compassion.

Compassion knows no judgment of another. Morality is not in its domain. Spirituality is. When compassion emerges in us, we drop our resistances to other person's, appearances, life issues, addictions or delusions and recognize that each, at their core, is a child of God...and that we are connected to them and they are
connected to us. The sense of separation genuinely disappears.

We can begin to discover our own essential (divine) nature, and truly in that discovery, uncover the remarkable depth of spirit that colors the palate of our life, as we open to a more compassionate way of life.

All spiritual teachers remind us of who we are at the core or essence level of our being. They tend to reveal some of hitherto unknown aspects or radiant layers of the soul, and in that uncovering we stand naked in our soul's splendor wherein we march toward the integration of or ownership of (in psychological language) our sacred self. This leads us to the doorway of compassion.

Finally, as we enter the domain of compassion's embrace, we leave behind our human ego's need for results, for the mental/emotional need to control the end results or to judge the actual appearances of such compassionate acts as we may be deeply led to perform, offer or give to one or many.

If we approach compassion as a goal as in "I am going to develop compassion" or "I am going to achieve compassion as my spiritual goal," we have a long, long, long road ahead. I believe it is possible to move toward the goal, indeed, but not
as an intellectual exercise or effort of the will or emotionally ego backed demand. For example, it's my intention (will) to develop a compassionate approach to life because I really want to serve others (ego) especially neglected children. We need to ask of ourselves the questions that allow us to see something of service beyond an egoic focus, because it appears grand or makes us look or appear to be really spiritual!

As we allow an opening to compassion that we step into the ocean and allow ourselves to be bathed in the water as it laps at our feet. Land is behind us. Water is in front of us. We stand with one foot in the sea the other on land and become a
conduit for a flow of cosmic force (water) to nourish the land, the (environment, people, places, life in any form, animal, plant, human).

We become a vessel, a conduit through which flows the grace of God. And as that flow opens in us, we see life in a very connected and truly, radiant manner. We see god in the sun and in the stars. We become aware that we are connected to a profound power that undergirds and sustains all life. Compassion is one of the fingers on the Hand of God that allow us to hold the dichotomy of being both divine and human, the mystery and the paradox of a human experience.