Compassion as Weakness
While in Colombia a week or so ago, I had an interesting conversation with a taxi driver. He was sympathizing with America’s “immigration problem,” comparing it to the onslaught of Venezuelans who have entered his country in recent years.
A word of explanation. As of September of last year, nearly 3 million Venezuelans have settled in Colombia, a country with a population of about 53 million where nearly 14 percent of the population – approximately 6.9 million people – are living on less than $2.15 a day. The United Nations Refugee Agency attributes the flight from Venezuela (An estimated 25 percent of the population have migrated.) to “rampant violence, inflation, gang warfare, soaring crime rates, and shortages of food, medicine and essential services ….”
For the Colombian taxi driver, these aren’t just statistics. The presence of so many poor Venezuelans in Colombia is personal. He grew up poor and continues to be poor, he said, and sees the Venezuelans as intruders, taking jobs and resources from people like him. He was unable to sympathize with them – even though they have no advantages in employment – nor with migrants from around the world who migrate to the U.S.
Latest Pandemic?
While I understand why he feels as he does, and sympathize with his economic and social plight, I can’t agree with the taxi driver and told him so. In my view, Venezuelans are fleeing their country for legitimate reasons and as human beings deserve respect. Colombians who resent them seem to be caught up in the latest serious worldwide pandemic: lack of compassion. But this cold-heartedness is especially acute in the U.S.
Many of us who live comfortably in the U.S., compared to the estimated 700 million people around the world who live in poverty, have the sense that our plight is somehow due to our own virtue or superiority when it is actually an accident of birth. Yes, purely an accident of birth. Ignoring this fact is, I believe, one reason many Americans are unable to feel compassion for migrants and refugees.
But the lack of compassion isn’t evident solely in our attitude toward immigrants. In my view, we are suffering from a general deterioration in our ability to feel compassion for others.
Insensitivity
An example is the insensitivity with which masses of employees are dismissed from corporations, and now from government. In the vast majority of cases, these are people who depend on their jobs to support themselves and their families. Losing your job is comparable to death; the loss is usually devastating, often signifying loss of home, transportation, food, and self-respect.
I believe another reason for the pandemic of cold-heartedness is an attitude that views compassion as weakness. It’s a kind of macho idea that you show strength by barreling ahead with your own wishes without regard to the well-being of others.
For people searching for God in the Judeo-Christian tradition, compassion is crucial.
One of the most poignant examples is found in the book of Micah, where the prophet succinctly encapsulates the divine expectation: “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”
Compassion on All He Has Made
And because people searching for God need to become God-like, Psalm 145 provides the model: “The Lord is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made.”
In the Christian Bible, in his Letter to the Ephesians, Paul urges his readers to “be kind and compassionate to one another,” and in writing to the Colossians, “as God’s chosen people, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.”
But compassion isn’t just for Christians and Jews, or would-be Christians and Jews. Far from being a weakness, it’s a basic human need, expressed beautifully by the Dalai Lama: “If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.”
