Empathy
A meditation on civilization's strength
My ministers have been encouraging us to think about empathy lately. At a monthly Bible study. In sermons on Sundays. During casual conversations. I hate to admit this. There might be a significant possible crack in my knowledge and practice of empathy. I don’t want to seek first to understand cruelty. I don’t want to extend a hand to those who hate. I don’t want to turn the other cheek when our world burns. I don’t want to forgive evil even one time. I especially don’t want to talk about empathy when powerful people declare empathy as Western Civilization’s fundamental weakness. Truth. Full Stop.
I am angry. I am pissed. I am hurt. I weep for our world. I want to pull out my hair, throw up, and move somewhere far away, but I am old enough and have run enough to know there are no geographical fixes. Plus, my country is my home. Empathy feels so 2008 — when Hope and Change won, speaking to the better angels of the country I deeply love. It was all so much easier then. Beautiful certainty danced alongside privilege and years of social justice progress. A constitution secured at least an amalgam of institutional empathy. I could rent empathy rather than buy it. I could rely on something/someone outside of myself — the rule of law, the powerful and connected — to quiet any dissonance I felt when I looked out my window or rolled up my sleeves.
It’s different now. I take a deep breath and unclench my fists and open my heart. My ministers are right. Now is the exact moment I need to practice empathy. Empathy that connects us all, holds our hurting, and feeds our hungry, realizing we are all connected, hurting, and hungry. Empathy that reaches out one heart at a time, to every heart, and simply loves. Empathy that imagines and builds and creates the beloved community. Remember, I could still spit nails. I do not condone where we are or fully understand how we got here. I don’t have to. I will not drink the poison. I must have somewhere to channel my anger. It makes sense that channeling it toward empathy is a net positive for me and my world. Like heart calisthenics that build big love. Like the river on which I grew up — powerful, abiding, beautiful flow that carries us to a peaceful edge. Like the tree roots that connect beneath the surface, securing life itself.
Empathy is something I've been thinking and writing about lately, too. I think Musk's statement was a slap in the face, a wake up call. It made us all confront the lack of empathy in our culture and in ourselves. Thanks for sharing this.
Beautifully written Katie! I know your exact feeling about not wanting to extend empathy to those who don’t deserve it, but your words have inspired me. Yet again!