BRINGING
CHESED INTO PRACTICE
The
other day somebody asked me: what makes you live the way you live now?
Being
a missionary of the Sacred Heart for about forty years I am still searching for
an answer. I started out with the firm conviction that God is good and
compassionate to people, and so we should be good and compassionate to people, or - as
the Dutch expression goes - God has
heart for people and therefore we ought to have heart for them. But my God, how
many times did I loose track, how many times did I cry out: God, if it is true
that you are compassionate, that you have heart for humanity, where the hell are
you?
It
was and still is a lonely search, a hidden struggle within myself, but at the
same time a healing journey together with many, who time and again - whether I
wanted it or not - girded me and carried me where I did not wish to go (Jn. 21:18): my family, some of my confreres in the
I
want to report to you something of this often lonely and yet collective search; I want to
do this somehow in the same way that the spies did when they reported to Moses
about their mission to the promised land. They brought along all kinds of
fruits, still unknown to them.
EL
CHASID: God, who practises >chesed=,
compassionate and faithful
A
FRUITFUL REPORT
1. Fruits
They
grow everywhere ..... as a free gift of
nature ..... just
to quench everybody’s thirst even a little bit........ Plucked they shrivel rapidly .... and
dry up quickly .... like people, who are uprooted and
living at society’s margin.
Shrivelled
faces .... they don’t leave
us cold, indifferent ..... commiseration
....compassion...
One,
who doesn’t feel a spark of compassion, is callous, harsh, must have a heart of
stone.
Compassion .. source of action... of aid and relief ..,.. counterweight to offset our urge to possess unnecessary things.
Blessed
are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy (Matthew 5,8)
2. Coconut
A
rock-hard shell ..... not to
crack ......crushing in the fall.... but once split open ..a
soft heart of pure whiteness.... filled
with refreshing water: ... men.... chastened by poverty and adversity....
Poverty .... corruption
.... exploitation .....misery.....
Indignation ..... anger .... rage within us .... against whom?.....
Indignation
... rage ....the other side of compassion, rock-hard
and rough outside ... soft and pure
inside..... strong minded and merciful ......
unyielding in the struggle.... generous...
and magnanimous in the victory....
Indignation,
anger, rage .... looks for an outlet.... solidarity - and pressure-groups ... campaigns
The
more we possess this anger, ... the nearer we are
near to those who are in danger of becoming losers in life.... all the more we
share in God's anger.
3. Pomegranate .... fig....
So
painfully helpless .... full
of pimples and defects... not attractive... but inside .…surprisingly
energy-rich ....full of nutritious seeds .... like a
storehouse prepared for bad times ..... the amazing
man living a marginal existence way down in the society’s backyard.
We
were very glad to be of help ... wherever we could ....
but .... what could we do?
... we ran
into our limitations... our illusions shattered one after the other .... our dreams fell apart into pieces, one after another ...
what am I doing here for Gods sake....?
Shame
....thrown back upon our own resources...our own limitations... a hard lesson
in modesty .... in humility
... a painful way of chastening
Going
back home.... to a safe country retreat?..... or learning to walk
vulnerably with them ... where at? .....
God only knows .... listening
....learning .... accepting that they know better ....
what is their secret...?.
We
were toppled from our pedestal .... so
we placed them on a pedestal.... the poor, the weak ... the losers becoming our heroes? .... whatever they said, whatever they did, had to be good .... wishful
thinking..... nonsense ...but it did us good ... for a little while .... after
all they too turned out to be not as perfect as we had wished them to be ...
they fell short of our unrealistic expectations.
A
great disillusion... disappointment... mental crisis ....
we feel disappointed ... abandoned ... a lonely
struggle ....
4. Grain, maize, rice
Seeds
from different parts of the world, ... each with a different taste..... yet all good for
whoever's hungry stomach. At all times called to become food
.... to die to themselves ... to rise from
the dead ... and to give again a hundredfold..... From where comes this timeless breath of life?.... Innocent parable of the human mystery ....of God?
Pain.....
distress .... Failure ..... their suffering..... our suffering
.... all people’s suffering, like seeds of grain and rice know their own disintegration....
But
also a passionate urge ... an irrepressible will to go on with life ...in the quest for justice ...
for peace, happiness ... among people
wherever in this world.....
The
same compassion..... the same anger .... the same chastening .... the same
hope.... all healing passions to share life with whom life is denied ... over
there or here .... does it make any difference?
Is
life not suffering? .... Is compassion not life?....
people's souls awakening for humanity .... for
divinity? Is it coincidence that people are yearning for God and God hearing people’s crying
... meet each other at the cross?
So,
if ever we want to bestow a title upon God, it shall be:
El
Chasid
Chesed
He
Who is compassionate and faithful as only God can be.
A
BIT OF COMMENTARY ON THE REFLECTION
Ad
1: compassion and faithfulness
Since
my return from the Philippines in 1985 I have been a member of the so-called chesed-community, a group of people who tries to live out
this biblical concept of chesed, a commitment which involves for me a
cohabitation with marginalized young people, in a neighbourhood of low social
status, which, however, has its own charm.
We
pitched our tents in an ordinary working-class district and called ourselves chesed
Many
things can come into this: kings who want peace, but also a guest who is given
hospitality, or members of a family, who seal their mutual relations in a pact.
God made such a pact with
Compassion
is the most characteristic quality: the ban to abuse a powerful position, the
obligation to strengthen the weaker party. There is an element of dependence
but there is also the possibility to point out the conditions of the pact to
the stronger party and so to bring in an element of equality in virtue of the
pact.
That
is the reason that we find in the pact between God and
'The
Lord is a compassionate and gracious God
He
is slow to anger and strong in love and fidelity
He
brings about justice and mercy;
He
forgives crime and breach of contract and sin,
but he will not let it go
clear.' (ps.85)
In
Jewish practice one cannot imagine a pact, a covenant, without love and mercy,
without compassion and fidelity.
It
may sound rather conceited when we say that we would like to enter into such a
pact with people who are weak and vulnerable in church and society. It is a
challenge to let our life be determined by the
weakness and the vulnerability of others. Yet we MSC in the community are the youngest generation of
a group of people who, a century ago, decided to venture forth in this way,
together and for life. Our official name sounds a bit pompous: Missionaries of
the Sacred Heart,
I
live with another member of the community, an
On
our side we experience a loss of privacy and the ongoing question of what it means
to be successful in life: what does it mean, when people end up in prostitution,
in psychiatry, and/or in criminality, since it seems inevitable that these are
the areas which are waiting for our guests in the future.
Ad 2: the other side of
compassion: anger, taking sides
Compassion
and fidelity: those are fundamental values of our life and we hope people judge
us to be faithful especially in this regard. In the midst of churchy squabbles and
social conflicts we want to try to find our way. In this power play people
want to stand as victors. They calculate their chances, look for allies, build
power blocks and develop structures that will bring them to power and keep them
in power. It is a merciless game that in the end will lead a life on its own
like a Frankenstein. One is played off against the other; he who engages in
this kind of game cannot have heart for people. In order to win he has to be
heartless and untrustworthy.
In
this ruthless play an attitude of compassion and fidelity has no place. It
looks ridiculous and useless. All the same we want the losers to touch us, we want to suffer with them and to remain faithful to
them. We cannot be satisfied if losers remain losers but neither do we want
them to become victors. We want to do everything in our power to break the
vicious cycle of money, power and status so that they too may enter the Kingdom
of justice, peace and liberation. As Missionaries of the Sacred Heart we have
set ourselves free to do this, and even, if necessary, to start all over again.
Compassion
without fidelity is untrustworthy, fidelity without compassion is ruthless.
Ad
3: Crisis:
As
religious we think we ought to have a social position. Apparently it is a
disputed one. Church and society have placed us as a matter of course among the
middle class. The salary scale we are entitled to is way above the average. We
tend to think that this is normal. After all, we know how to use words and we
have brains; we can argue a point and everything is neatly put in order in our
lives. We are highly qualified and trained to keep a distance. We feel at home
among middle-class people. But when you live in a certain milieu you begin
to think like them, speak like them, act like them with the same prejudices and
justifications, the same manners and behaviour. Social and religious problems
are judged with one eye, casting envious looks at the top and one having a
squint while looking down. Our judgement becomes a middle-class judgement, our
social position the point of reference while looking at people and judging
them. We even read and understand the Bible from that vantage point and in that
way we reflect on what faith demands of us. We take on certain tasks and
perform certain activities which seem to be right and good according to our
conscience.
It
is the loyalty, with which chesed is done, that
undermines our claim and even strips us of our desire to have a social status. Chesed is possible only in a long-standing relationship in which there is trust between the parties .....
and the parties know that they find themselves in the
same reality. The pain of one becomes an experienced pain for the other; the
need of one is experienced also as the need by the other. Compassion makes one
open and prevents that one closes oneself to the misery of the other. The
shield of self protection burns away in the heat of the other’s presence who then appears in his/her injuries, smallness and
impotence. Loyalty and compassion belong together: loyalty without compassion
is harsh and inhuman, because then, the other is no longer seen in his/her
need. And compassion without loyalty is untrustworthy, because it is, then, too
incidental and does not offer human security. (S.v. Tilborg in: Without protection in the heat of life: Bringing
biblical chesed into practice)
:
Ad 4: The path of the
Bodhisattva And what does the Lord require
of you
But
to do justice,
And
to love chesed,
And
to walk humbly with your God
(Micah 6,8)
In
the beginning of our era, the doctrine of the bodhisattva develops in the
Buddhist tradition: the bodhisattva is the person who, out of compassion with
all the living beings, renounces for him/herself the attainment of enlightenment
until all beings are saved: the ideal of the bodhisattva as the
compassionate saviour of everything alive.
In
The path of the Bodhisattva written in the seventh century by Santidiva, this is expressed in the following:
I
would like to be a remedy for the sick,
be their doctor and helper
until there is no longer
sickness.
I
would like to extinguish the burning pain of hunger
and thirst with rain of
food and drink.
I
would like to be food and drink myself
in times of famine at the
end of a world-era.
I
want to be a protector for those who are unprotected,
a leader for those who
are on a journey,
a ship, dam or bridge for
those
who want to reach the other
side;
A
lamp for those who need light,
a bed for those who need
rest,
and a slave for all who are
in need of one;
The
elements earth, water, fire and wind
are in various ways at the
service of innumerable beings who populate the endless universe.
In
the same way, I want to be in many various ways
the life substance for all
beings
who exist in the universe
until all are liberated from pain.
(Quotation
from S. Van Tilborg: Without protection in the heat
of life)
When
we set ourselves on the path of the bodhisattva, we set out on the path of
total helpfulness, of the purest form of altruism. It will be a never-ending path.
It is demanding: it demands of us outright honesty and self-knowledge without
self-contempt, emptying ourselves, taking the form of a servant (Philippians 2,7).
In
this way we find that we have a great deal of freedom; we do not need to set up a
definite plan for helping; we do not set goals which have to be met; we do not
ask for approval. We, simply, see how things work out and are present in all the up
and downs. To be there also, when things go totally wrong; with drugs, prostitution,
criminal behaviour, serious illness; little knowledge of the past or any hope
for the future; no plans, no goals; time and again trying to come back to
loyalty and compassion in ongoing discussions, sharing, setbacks, surprises.
It
is a painstaking process, an every-day effort. An attitude of compassion and
fidelity is like a story of many small steps: to look among the rubble of every
day for the bits and pieces that will make the mosaic. Each little bit counts,
each small step is important. Sometimes we do well, at other times we fail, but
always it remains a precious and vulnerable
adventure.
The
story of the Old and the New Testament is a reflection of the struggle between
God and humanity to have heart for the losers in life. The power play is being waged
in all its viciousness. The higher the stakes the more
merciless and untrustworthy the players. The game is compelling and not
many can resist its allure. Those, who can resist, choose the side of the
losers and in this way keep the covenant of Chesed
alive. Those are the people who today may continue to write our history,
towards the future.
We
have put our cards on the table, shown who we are; we have taken our place in
society, the place where we believe we belong. We are clear what form our
presence will take within the church. Without much pretension we have made the first
small steps which for some of the losers can mean a little more peace and
justice, love and liberation, healing and redemption. Do we live then in the
heart of the Covenant, at the basis of the church, free from the powers and
dominions?
May
we experience God's Chesed with us: 'God who is
merciful and gracious, slow to anger and strong in love and fidelity'? May we share then chesed
with those for whom no one seems to care?
CHESED:
COMPASSION
Antiphon:
EL CHASID: GOD, COMPASSIONATE
CHESED-PRAYER
Whenever
an appeal is made
to my compassion today,
I
will not run away from it.
I
will take the burden of compassion upon me;
I
resolve to bear it.
I
do not turn away.
I
do not flee. I am not afraid.
Neither
do I yield nor do I hesitate.
Why?
Because the liberation of all living creatures
is today my desire and
commitment. (Santideva)