Compassionate Faith: Not an Oxymoron

Regrettably, often when people think of faiths they remember the worst of it. Each tradition has its own history of moral failure and moral excellence. In most cases, the moral failure of faiths is highlighted by its critics and obviated by many of its followers. Conversely, the detractors of faiths and worldviews (both of faith and secularist and atheists) obviate the moral and ethical accomplishments of people with whom they disagree.

Speaking from my place in the world, Christians have a mixed legacy of ethical failure and greatness. I am well aware of many of the moral and ethical horrors within the history of Christianity; the Inquisition, Crusades, slavery, the annihilation of Indigenous groups for sake of Cross and Crown, witch-burning, religious wars and persecution. The list could go on. This is without mentioning the tragic silence of many Christians against many atrocities throughout generations. Still Christians the world over have been a part of ethical progress and renewal. Christians, along with others, were at the heart of abolitionist movements, the Civil Rights movement, suffragists movements, campaigns against genocide and torture. For every abuse you also have saints like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Mother Teresa, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Despite our shortcomings, Christianity is not inconsistent with compassion.

In light of the mixed ethical legacy of all faiths and worldviews I thank Karen Armstrong for appealing to one of the noblest of human virtues embraced by all people of good will, compassion. Compassion comes from the Latin "com" and "passio," to suffer with or suffer alongside. Compassion is solidarity with our fellow human beings and the whole created order in their brokenness and need. Throughout history there have been efforts to high-jack all faiths in ways that oppress and dehumanize the other. Nevertheless, there remains in the DNA and the intrinsic fiber of faith a resistance to co-optation and evil domestication. Faith will not go gently into the dark night of violence, dehumanization, and oppression. In every generation there will be witnesses (marturion) who call us to our "higher angels" of love, compassion, mercy, and justice. Despite our stubborn human proclivities to other and alienate the very best of our teachings call us to; "love our neighbors and enemies," "do unto others as you would have them do unto you," "love the stranger and the alien," "remember the widow, the orphan, and the stranger," "bless those who persecute us," and "be peacemakers."

Reinhold Niebuhr, the great 20th century Christian theologian, had a firm understanding of humanity's, society's, and religion's capacity for sinfulness and self-transcendence. His works reflect the dialectical nature of people, systems, and ideologies, consider some of the titles The Children of Light and Children of Darkness, Moral Man and Immoral Society, The Nature and Destiny of Man, Leaves from the Notebook of A Tamed Cynic, etc. I agree with Niebuhr we have great capacity for both sin and transcendence. May Dr. Armstrong's call for compassion remind us to seek the latter. A Call for Compassion is a clarion call do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly before our God.

By Gabriel Salguero  |  November 11, 2008; 11:02 AM ET  | Category:  Interfaith Issues
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