Being Compassionate

The continuing reports in the press expressing concern about the quality of care for elderly people in care homes and the National Health Service continue. Recently the Patients Association and Care Quality Commission have both recently provided detailed studies of what they describe as "shocking" levels of care in the NHS. Apparently problems are compounded for the elderly because of shortages of nursing staff and the prevalence of institutionalised ageism.

A report by the Commission on Dignity in Care whose message was that, "Being compassionate should be as important as being clever when it comes to the recruitment of staff." This was one of the recommendations made by the commission for improving dignity in care for older people in hospitals and care homes in England. They said that it has become clear that many elderly people are being seriously let down because of poor standards of care.

Last year, February, 2011, a report on the plight of the elderly was published by Ann Abraham the health service ombudsman. A Guardian caption on the publication of this report read, "Some elderly patients were given no help to eat or left in urine soaked clothes, according to the health service ombudsman". Ann Abraham's report was a catalogue of neglect and cruelty and highlighted examples, 10 cases, where elderly people were not treated with either, care, dignity, or respect as they came towards the end of their lives.

Words and phrases introduced into this debate include 'emotional intelligence', and 'empathy' as well as 'compassion'. There is a power, I think in these words because the caring services cannot operate properly without a preponderance of such qualities. Yet compassion (or can we go a step further and say love?) seems to be such a threat to the status quo. One of the things we rarely if ever hear politicians talking about is love and what is love if it's not the ability to understand, to put oneself in the other person shoes, to care deeply about the fate and well-being of others. What is love if it's not a desire to seek conciliation to bring peace and harmony and to alleviate suffering in the world? Humility is an aspect of a love that requires us to put others before ourselves and want what is right for everyone no matter who they may be.

There is this contradiction that we live with, that says we don't want to die young and yet we don't want to get old even though we know we have to die. So if we are lucky enough we may have a long and full life and will therefore get old. This is one of the challenges we all must face. In general our growing old and our inevitable death will demand an acceptance that the world continues to change and that we cannot for ever be part of it. Our final journey, death, will be a letting go of everything that we have known and loved on this earth.

In the nursing homes and care homes for the elderly there is naturally a more explicit recognition of this inevitability. In these care homes, there exists a tremendous opportunity for meaningful ministry, to share time with its residents and to be with them in the final phase of their lives. In care homes for the elderly there is a hunger for visitors, for company and for spiritual solace. At this stage in their lives many older people crave that company, a friendly face, a sympathetic ear and just a few encouraging words. It's not much to ask but it can make a big difference. In one care home, a woman, demented and confused, alone in her room in the hours of darkness, was heard crying out to God and praying, "O God, I am so alone, I don't know where I am, I don't know how I got here, but I'm so lonely, please send somebody to see me!"

The first verses of Psalm 22 read:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?

O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer; and by night, but find no rest.

The woman's words and the words from the Psalm speak pitifully of a profound sense of abandonment, of pain and desolation. It seems that the secular world has forgotten largely that "man cannot live by bread alone." Where there is a perceived need for ministry it should be offered. Simply spending time with the elderly is a gift that the Church should provide; the gift of human contact and spiritual solace.

Spiritual but Not Religious?

Perhaps the big attraction for the modern liberal individual private spirituality is that it seems to offer the prospect of personal or spiritual growth that can be had without responsibility or without any external commitment. It seems the ultimate working out of an unbridled capitalist ideology whose advocates can say that there is no such thing as society only individuals. And these individuals, consumers if you like, can go and buy their faith as a commodity, something to be consumed or disposed of until the next fad comes around so that one's life can become a continual search, a merry go round of esoteric, mystical, spiritual, workshops, much like the endless stream of self-help publications all promising a pathway to happiness and no doubt to success and wealth. It all becomes a mish-mash of competing ideas, a kaleidoscope jamboree where one can hop from one idea to the next. But where does it all end?

I think in a way it ends up becoming just like the worst aspects of the religion that was rejected in the first place, the religion that placed emphasis on the law, and on self righteousness, on one's own spiritual purity and individual salvation. We are reminded of the famous exchange that Jesus had with one such spiritual seeker when Jesus was once walking down a road and a man ran up to him saying, "Good teacher what must I do to have eternal life?" In this story Jesus says, 'Why do you call me good? Only God is good. Jesus simply reminded him to keep the Ten Commandments, to which the man replied, "I have obeyed all these commandments since I was a young man". Then Jesus looked closely at him and replied saying, "There's still one thing to do. Go and sell everything you own. Give the money to the poor and you will have riches in heaven. Then come with me." "When the man heard this he became very sad because he was very rich.

Then Jesus looked at his disciples and said to them, "It's hard for rich people to get into God's kingdom" According to Mark, even the disciples were shocked to hear Jesus say this and just to make sure that nobody was in any doubt he said, "In fact its easier for a camel to pass through the eye of needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God!

And when we think about it too it is quite a shocking revelation, it is a disclosure about the true path to the spiritual life, it clearly is not about adhering to this law or that law though of course it may help, and it's not about personal salvation in terms of self righteousness as the man found out but of a giving up of everything of all that we love for God. When the disciples saw how harsh the terms for salvation were, they asked, 'How can anyone ever be saved?' Jesus simply replied there are some things that people cannot do, but God can do anything." Like the mustard seed we have to let the kingdom of heaven grow slowly and gradually within us, we have to let God into our lives in order to make these changes for us. And in a church or a religious community we are more easily sustained in our religious or spiritual lives, our spiritual quests, where we are reminded to love God and to love our neighbour as ourselves, to care for others. It was no accident either that Jesus told the man to give his money to the poor because the true spiritual life demands that we must pour out our love in the service of others.

An editorial in a New York church magazine commented that being 'spiritual but not religious' can lead to complacency and self-centeredness,"  "If it's just you and God in your room and a religious community makes no demands on you, why help the poor? The religious life is not an easy option, it has its rewards but it necessarily has its responsibilities as well. Religion is not a hobby or a pastime, it's not something to be 'privatised' or made subject as part of this individualistic trend to 'aggressive marketing', and sold as being 'spiritual but not religious'. Rather it's a calling, a way of life that acknowledges people's need for each other, in worship, in community together where we may acknowledge that divine love, the presence of God in our lives.

Who Is My Neighbour?

On my regular jaunts to the local supermarket I usually go to the newspaper stand and survey the newspaper headlines. I can't help but look particularly at those papers that have become known as the 'red tops' not to mention the other tabloid newspapers. Usually these newspapers carry all sorts of weird and wonderful headlines, well probably not wonderful, and in most cases, in my opinion, definitely not wonderful.

Such tabloids report with depressing regularity on a particular group of people making them the main headline targets of vilification, unwarranted abuse, and persecution. They are of course, refugees who in recent years have become known as asylum seekers. And where the question of asylum or immigration is brought up it appears to me that there are no limits, no standards of human decency to which these so-called newspapers can be held to account. And I get the impression that there are no depths to which they will not sink in their appeal to negativity, to the darkest side of human nature, to petty minded nationalism and racial hatred.

There was for example the Daily Star's headline on August 21st 2003: “Asylum Seekers Eat Our Donkeys”. This story suggested that African asylum seekers used a lorry to steal nine donkeys from an area of east London because apparently, Africans, Somalis in this case consider donkey to be a delicacy. In spite of the fact that the Sun newspaper had admitted making up a story earlier in the year about asylum seekers stealing swans from local parks, roasting and eating them, the story about asylum seekers stealing and eating donkeys got wide coverage on radio stations and in other newspapers. In this case it was the Daily Star's turn to admit that their story too was a fabrication. However, in spite of the inflammatory and derogatory nature of such stories, no action was taken against these papers. Apologies were eventually published by both newspapers but of course, not writ large on the front page.

The war against asylum seekers or to be correct refugees who are seeking asylum is not simply confined to the racist fantasies of the Daily Star or the Sun. This war, a very one-sided war, is a war that is raging twenty four hours a day. In fact you can't pick up a newspaper or view online media without there being some story about refugees. These stories seem to fall in to two categories. They are either stories that vilify asylum seekers, either as scroungers, terrorists or criminals or they are stories of cruelty to asylum seekers. In January of this year the Daily Telegraph ran a headline that 371,000 immigrants were claiming benefits. This headline obviously intended to stir up resentment against asylum seekers was condemned in letter by Sir Michael Scholar, the head of the UK Statistics Authority in which he wrote: "The Statistics Authority recognises that Ministers often want to present published statistical information in the way that best serves their political objectives, and that this is part of the cut and thrust of political debate."

He also stated that 'statistics are both highly relevant to public policy and highly vulnerable to misinterpretation.' In the same letter he added, 'There are some important caveats and weaknesses that need to be explained carefully and objectively to Parliament and the news media at the time of publication. In other words the Work and Pensions Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith who released the story and the Daily Telegraph who published the story were misrepresenting the truth for political gain. But this political game has real consequences for the people at the receiving end. The underlying racism within our society now finds its expression on the question of immigration, allowing manifest racism and cruelty through the way that we as a nation treat asylum seekers.

In the same month (January 2012) a government Home Affairs Select Committee Inquiry met to discuss and look into the treatment of asylum seekers who are being deported from the UK.  This inquiry followed the death of Jimmy Mubenga while he was being deported from Heathrow to Angola in 2010. Three G4S security guards escorting him were arrested and are still under police investigation. The MPs added that they were shocked to find that private security escorts used racist language in front of UKBA staff and official prison inspectors. 'It is possibly the result of a relationship between the agency and its contractors which had become too cosy,' said their report. Keith Vaz MP said he was disappointed there had been little progress in the police investigation into Mubenga's death.

One of the most shocking stories of 2011 was of how a boat carrying seventy two political refugees from Libya including children was heading for the Italian island of Lampedusa when it suffered fuel loss and engine failure. The Italian authorities were aware of the situation and also NATO ships were operating in the area. An army helicopter was dispatched some water and fuel and some bread was lowered onto the stricken ship. There was a promise of more aid to come but it never arrived. The boat drifted aimlessly and dangerously for days. Then a NATO aircraft carrier came into view, low flying aircraft flew over the boat and the refugees held up two starving children. But their plight was ignored. Eventually after sixteen days without food and water the boat was washed up on a beach in Libya. Sixty one of the original passengers had by this time died of hunger and thirst including the children; eleven survived. However one died shortly after arriving on dry land and another died in a Libyan jail. The surviving refugees were clear that their plight was definitely ignored and they know that the people who could have rescued them were indifferent to their plight.

No matter what anyone says, no matter how we as a nation might bury our heads in the sand or try to justify the policies on asylum, in effect how we treat refugees, we cannot ignore these crimes of inhumanity to others. Moreover, there is no way we can extol the virtues of the 'Charter for Compassion', call our selves people of faith, or even Christian whilst we remain silent on what in some way has become a silent holocaust. This barbaric treatment of vulnerable human beings has become so normalised and common place that we seem to be no longer aware of it.

As a church we are called by God to be a prophetic voice for the oppressed and so it cannot be right that church goers of any creed or denomination should condemn immigrants or people of another race or creed or be indifferent to their suffering. And yet we know unfortunately that this can often be the case. As a counter, we need to constantly show that transforming spiritual lessons can be found in simply being there for others. In fact the greatest of all the laws apart from loving God, is to 'love thy neighbour as thyself.' We know from the greatest religious teacher of all time, Jesus, that our neighbour is not merely the person next door but anyone we might meet. For in his parable of the Good Samaritan, our neighbour becomes someone who we might not altogether approve of, our neighbour in this life we have on earth may well be a stranger.

We should know that every person is a child of God, there is that divine light in each person, and so each person we have ever met and will ever meet will be in effect, an encounter with God. Jesus reminds us that the King will say, 'In as much as you did it to the least of these you did it unto me.' Throughout the pages of the Bible one of God's most consistent messages is that of the requirement to provide hospitality. It is a requirement not an option. In Deuteronomy (10: 19) we are commanded to 'Love the stranger' and we are reminded of our own vulnerability: 'for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.' This message, this injunction, we should write not only on the walls of our churches and chapels but on our hearts as well.

A Soul's Journey

A Soul's Journey

The soul's journey is also a life's journey that we have all embarked upon by the very act of being born. We each have a life, a life that has been given to us, apparently as a free gift, an act of grace you could say, for we've done nothing to deserve it. We have done nothing to receive the gift of each new day as it comes with all the privileges that it brings, the rich experiences that that we may count as good or bad along with the joys and sorrows of the relationships that we must all share with each other.

We embark on this soul's journey, hopefully a journey that will entail a long life on this earth and we often do not recognise what we have been given. In short, we are often lacking in gratitude as we forget or ignore the injunction to 'count one's blessings' as though counting one's blessings is some sort of superficial throw-away remark rather than key to successful living. To have a grateful heart is an essential requisite for the soul's journey, to live each day as it comes, to take pleasure in the small things as well as the big events, to feel love and compassion even in some of the most hopeless of situations and to know that such sublime goodness comes from the eternal God, the God according to St Paul, is the God ' In whom we live and move and have our being.'

In this soul's journey we begin our earthly lives in a state of innocence, and in the earliest stages we are truly in the Garden of Eden. But the child soon finds the world with all its urgency, its demands, its mores and its attractions. The innocence of infancy our Garden of Eden very quickly becomes closed to us. In the book of Genesis we read how Adam and Eve were driven out of Eden and then at the east of the garden of Eden God placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life. The soul's journey I think, is to return to the garden and perhaps we heard an echo of that in the 1970's Woodstock song:

By the time I got to Woodstock
They were half a million strong
Everywhere there was songs and celebration
And I dreamed I saw the bombers
Riding shotgun in the sky
Turning into butterflies
Above our nation

We are stardust, we are golden
And we've got to get ourselves back to the garden

Or perhaps as Jesus said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

The story of the prodigal son is one such parable of a soul's journey a story in which a younger son leaves his father and goes out into the world spending his inheritance in wild living until he becomes destitute and returns home in poverty to his father. The true meaning of the story is of course that the son realises, that the world and all its attractions can not provide the authentic joy of living that we desire at our deepest level, and that this can only be found in returning to the source of our being to God or in this case the Father, who truly loved him and rejoiced at his home coming.

Most of Jesus' teachings were in fact simply about this very important and fundamental matter, about the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven, it's a state of being that people everywhere, throughout the ages have sought, and have wanted to hear about. Intuitively they have yearned to go beyond the apparent superficiality of their lives in search of a deeper meaning beyond a temporal existence. If we can somehow visualise life in first century Palestine, a primitive world without the benefits of mass literacy and the technology of the modern age and if we can imagine a man like Jesus who can teach, who can provide answers, and can hold people in thrall with the spiritual power of his words. And how those words would strike right at the heart and soul of his listeners, there would be hundreds and sometimes thousands of them pressing on to him as a crowd. Often he would be obliged to preach from the deck of a fishing boat from the Sea of Galilee in order avoid the crush of eager people, straining to hear his words.

His messages were coined in simple terms like the Kingdom of Heaven is like a pearl of great price so that much so that a merchant, a collector of pearls would sell all he had in order to buy it. 'The Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus would say, is within.' How many times did he tell them? How many times did they need to hear it? And how many times do we need to be told? It's really a key question since experiences, ideas and thoughts come, piling into our minds, cascading, each one on top of the other, and the most immediate impression thought supplanting the last one and so on. We can hear the truth, but it can easily be subverted and beguiled by the so called rationalists and by our own pessimistic thought. The resonant words of the great sages can lead us to a deeper truth, their words become pointers on the soul's journey but they are words all too easily forgotten when we get lost once again in the world.

This is the trap that we all fall too easily into, we know the truth we have heard the message, and loved hearing it but all to often we find that the ideas we love to hear become like the seeds exemplified in Jesus' Parable of the Sower: 'Some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil. But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them.'

 I wonder if the question is not so much about the inherent weakness of the human mind but rather a question of focus. In knowing and hearing what is good and true we must ensure that our best ideals become like the seeds that fall on good soil and bring  forth grain, as Jesus would have it, 'some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.'

Good soil and good seed can create a beautiful garden. A beautiful garden with lawns flower beds and perhaps fountains and pools of water. This beautiful garden was only created and obtained though hard labour and thoughtful design, a pleasure to see, to visit and to be in. We can close our eyes now and imagine it. There in this garden of the mind's eye we can hear the birds sing, feel the soft warm breeze of a summer's day, smell the fragrance of the flowers, and perhaps hear a gentle splash as the fish disturb the water with a sudden movement.

The garden is sustained by the work of its keepers; the weeds and the rubbish are kept out and constantly removed. And likewise, so in our minds, the destructive seeds of negativity of cynicism of disbelief we must also constantly weed out ensuring that only the seeds of positive self-development, seeds that can grow to bear out the spiritual truths within the garden of the mind, our own minds are permitted. This garden we seek to build in the mind, this way of being of becoming, is no soft option. Harder than physical labour it requires consistency, discipline and determination to keep heart and mind focussed on the destination of the soul's journey. If we cannot overcome our own selves, if we cannot embody the change we want to see, how can our lives speak for a world we want to see?

It is important to recognise that such change begins at the level of consciousness: our own consciousness. That is why in St Paul's letter to the Romans he wrote: "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect." We are being told amongst other things not to indulge in back-biting, gossip, and avarice, or perhaps to face up to life's demands, to become more than what we are, to meet our full potential and in doing so to reap the rich rewards of  our faith, our courage and our labours.

Betrayal

Betrayal arises from disjunction, a disjunction between wilful thought and a deeper truth. When that disjunction becomes apparent to the individual concerned, there is remorse and personal turmoil. Life becomes hell.

As we know, Judas in his realisation and remorse for what he had done threw the money back into the temple and then hung himself. The money that Judas threw back could not be put into the temple coffers because it was blood money and so the chief priests used the money to buy a potter's field as a burial ground for foreigners. And even today, in Jerusalem, the field still exists and is known as The Field of Blood.

Unable to bear the burden of his guilt, Judas took his own life. But surely Judas was forgiven. When Peter asked how many times he should forgive someone who had wronged him, Jesus replied, not merely seven times but 'seventy seven times'. On another occasion, as we all know, Jesus said, "He that is without sin among you - let him cast the first stone."

The French enlightenment philosopher and historian, Voltaire wrote, "People continue to commit atrocities as long they believe in absurdities." And so this sin, in the end becomes a betrayal of our own humanity, a denial of our own true nature, of who we truly are. When that disjunction becomes apparent we may find also that redemption is not very far away.

The Christ

In William Blake's painting, Christ's Entry into Jerusalem, we have this glorious, mystical Christ.  There are the crowds, and many are bowing in deep humility. Who are they worshipping? They are worshipping The Christ, not a Christ that is simply 'out there' an external figure, but the true Christ, the Christ that lives within them as it does in us, the Christ that is ultimately who they really are; our own potentiality. In surrender, the mystery of God's love is revealed.

Prayer

Pray in the present moment, be focussed and relaxed. Find the quiet centre within and know that anger and prayer are incompatible. But pray for transformation, for inner peace, for an awakening, for a knowing that can lead to the fullest realisation so that like St Augustine we may ultimately confess:

"You have made us for yourself. O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you." Amen