Jesus’ power
is expressed in the weakness of love. His own experience as victim of his
passion is not a place where he gets stuck. He neither curses his oppressors
nor relishes his victimhood. He trusts that he is the beloved of the Father and
so he is free to suffer because he knows it does not define him. Now risen from the dead, he shows us that there is nothing to fear, because
like him, we are at once very poor, very wounded sinners and at the very same time richly blest and most beloved. Beloved
sinners.
Compassion
involves growth in this insight. Compassion leads us to union and intimacy with
our very wounded inner self, the wounded neighbor who no longer needs to be
avoided, and ultimately with the truly Other - God most high who in Christ has
become God most low, most lowly, wounded, vulnerable and always near, though we
are so liable to miss him or close the door in his face.
I think
about why I avoid certain brothers, why certain brothers press my alarm button?
Probably they remind me of me – doing the stuff I do but hate myself for, the
stuff I try not to do but can’t stop. Maybe they remind me of the me I’ll never
be able to be, and so I’m tremendously jealous
How can
we help but think of Saint Francis, who realizes one day that he must embrace
that leper, the one from whom he had fled as the most repugnant of outcasts?
Small wonder that soon after this embrace, Francis will hide in a cave and cry
his heart out, grieving over all his sins. In the leper he has come too close
to the trauma of bitter self-recognition; the place, the reality to be avoided
at all costs, has become the scene of encounter, healing and freedom. Jesus was
right there, of all places, there in his “distressing disguise."
A drowsy
complacency or worse a fierce resistance are always a temptation. How will I
notice the poor one very near that I may find repugnant? Who is the ignored or
forgotten outcast in my world, in this monastery, in my heart, in my mirror -
the part of me that won’t go away, always begging to be let in even though I
want to keep it at a safe distance? How will I persevere in a “life that
ordinary obscure and laborious” that I often experience as wearying, useless
even ridiculous? Can I continue to trust that Jesus is constantly welcoming me
into the banquet of his compassionate solidarity with me in all of it?
We do not
have to run away anymore. We needn’t bother, or we’ll miss out. Christ Jesus is
always at the door of our hearts, waiting to be let in, the sore-covered
beggar, bearing the wounds of his own cruel passion, the wounds of our many
passions. The wounds, the sores – Jesus has got them, we’ve all got them
whatever kind they may be – all of them are our gateway to love and freedom and
compassion. Each morning in the Eucharist the Divine Beggar invites us to Holy
Communion with him. As we consume him, let us beg him - that his merciful
compassion may consume us more and more, beg him that like him we may become
more and more very wounded forgivers.
Meditation by one of the monks.
Meditation by one of the monks.
