Compassion Begins at Home

I shared in my Sunday lesson a couple of weeks ago that I have felt uncomfortable recently in the midst of the debate surrounding a couple of questions we are currently holding as a community, specifically whether to return the American and Christian flags to the sanctuary and whether to adopt a new name that omits the word ‘church.’ Strongly held beliefs and values have been expressed on both questions from varying perspective. I would love it if we all agreed and there was no tension; however, I know that we will never all agree on everything. My hope is that we can hold each other in the light of love and compassion always, even when we disagree.

My discomfort has ranged from mild irritation, anxiety, and sadness to anger and fear. I know that I am not alone. When we value something deeply, we have strong emotional reactions when we perceive those values as being disregarded or debased. I feel fear when I consider the possible repercussions of all of this.

Research in neuroscience has shown that our brains are hardwired to trigger responses of either fight, flight or freeze when we feel fear. I hesitate to reveal this, but my favored of the three is flight. I prefer to avoid any situation that has the potential of being adversarial, and I prefer to avoid conflict.

My default response is to either run away physically or retreat emotionally. Recently, I have observed myself thinking about running away. I have absolutely no plans to follow through on those thoughts, however. I have also been aware of my tendency to withdraw from myself and others emotionally. In my withdrawal, I don’t share as freely with others. It can also demonstrate in an unwillingness to own my feelings, especially when I experience feelings that I judge as “negative” - such as anger and fear.

Yesterday, through a guided process of self-connection, I connected deeply with my fear. In the process, I was able to feel empathy and compassion for the part of me that is so uncomfortable with discord. Consequently, I was then willing and able to more fully extend that empathy and compassion to all others.

  

I was reminded of the words of our master teacher and way shower, Jesus Christ, who said that second only to the commandment to love God is to love our neighbors as ourselves. The process yesterday provided me with a visceral experience that revealed to me, at a profound level, that I cannot truly love another unless and until I love myself. Loving myself includes giving myself empathy and compassion when I feel fear, or any other emotion I deem “negative.” It also includes embracing myself in compassion when I want to defend or blame. Loving myself requires that I love all of me, even the parts that I would rather deny at times.

Additionally, loving my neighbors as myself requires that I extend the same empathy and compassion to them, even those that I may at times regard as adversaries. Jesus also told us to love our enemies, not just our friends. When I am connected to love for myself, I am in conscious awareness of love for all creation. I know that, in Truth, I have no enemies. I know that my neighbor is myself. I am able to feel his pain. I am willing to meet her in her suffering. I am ready to hold each one with compassion.

To borrow from a well-known proverb, compassion begins at home. Each of us must give ourselves compassion, extend it to our immediate family and further to our spiritual family. Only then are we able to go out into the world and share compassion with others. Our mission at Unity Church of Denver is to inspire spiritual growth and personal transformation. My prayer is that we can embrace this current disharmony within our community as an opportunity for each of us to grow in our capacity to love ourselves and each other, even as we face our differences. Through our expression of compassion, we are transformed individually. As we are transformed, so is our spiritual community, and so the world.

I hold each of you and myself with a heart of compassion.

Please join us on Sunday as we explore further the power of compassion in our lives and how we can embody it and live it in every moment, every situation.