Compassion

Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into the places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.

                                                                                       Henri J.M. Nouwen

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I believe that following Jesus is not a matter of adhering to a religion

It is not a matter of doctrine

It is not about rituals

It is not adherence to a code of conduct

It is about a way

a way of thinking

a way of seeing

it is about becoming awake to the Presence of the Sacred

which is inside each of us

it is about one’s heart

one’s mind

being so transformed by the presence of love

that one is driven to live a life which is marked primarily

by

compassion

following Jesus is about allowing the Spirit the freedom

to dance through our souls with such abandon

that we are caught up

ecstatically

in the God Movement

and forget

at least for brief moments

ourselves

it is about having our point of focus move

from money, power, and prestige

to people

with Jesus it was always about people

poor people, rich people

smug religious people,

rampant “sinners”

weak people and strong people

but always people

whom he saw with the eyes of compassion and love

thus it was he entered fully

into the “condition of being human”

he was with people in their joy, yes!

making wine at weddings….

but mostly he was with them in those ‘places of pain’

where fear, confusion, and anguish lived

he was with them

for them

utterly

and following him in his way

means we join him

fueled by Sacred Presence

as best we can

nothing more

nothing

less