Innermost Being Blog

I sympathize with anyone who experiences the loss of a loved one because I have experienced grief myself. To sympathize with the pain of another is to join a community of feeling. When I offer condolences, I hope that the person is  comforted in knowing that they are not alone. I know that when my mother passed away a couple of year ago, I was comforted by the many expressions of sympathy I received from friends.

The emotions of sympathy and empathy are often confused. When we sympathize, we share the feelings of another person. We feel what they are feeling, whether it is grief or disappointment or frustration because we have had similar emotional experiences. When we empathize with another person, we understand or relate to their feelings because we can imagine what it would be like to be in their shoes.

There is a fine line between sympathy and empathy. For example, I will never know what it is like to lose a child because I don’t have children. I can only imagine how painful and heart-wrenching it is. Having experienced grief myself, I can imagine the feeling of loss, but I can’t fully feel what a mother feels in losing her child.

Even though empathy is not based on shared experience, I treasure the ability to consider things from another person’s point of view. You never really understand a person unless you can empathize with them. Empathy makes us more compassionate, more humble, more helpful. There, but for the grace of God, go I.

You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view . . . until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.

To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee

via Daily Prompt: Sympathize

To stretch my writing muscles, I have made several attempts this month to write in response to daily word prompts. I will admit that I only do so if the word grabs me in some way. Today the prompt is “inkling,” a word that reminds me of my childhood. I rarely hear anyone today say they have an inkling but I think my mother said it a time or two. She also used to ask, “how does that grab you?”

I looked online for the meaning of “inkling” and the phrase “have an inkling.” An inkling is a slight knowledge or suspicion, a hint. And according to The Phrase Finder, “there isn’t much we can do with an inkling other than to have one.”

What else can you do with a slight suspicion than have it? Well, you can reject it or trust it or dig further to find out if your inkling is right. My mother taught me to trust my instincts. Sometimes all you need is a little knowledge, a little hint to know what you should do.

This is the second time in a week that a word prompt has reminded me of my mother. A few days ago, the word was silhouette and I remembered a silhouette someone made of my mom’s profile. One of my siblings probably has it. I spent several minutes poring through my little sister’s photo collection on Facebook but didn’t find it. I found memories instead.

I miss my mom and I miss her silhouette and I miss her idioms. Grief sure comes at the strangest times with little prompting.

via Daily Prompt: Inkling

I am part of a small group of women who meet a couple of times a month for a Bible study. I am the oddball of the group. The five other women are ultra conservative. I guess I am best described as a progressive. I am most definitely in favor of social progress and improvement, whether it is improving access to affordable healthcare, protecting the environment, promoting voting rights and the equality of women, etc. I don’t want to go backwards. I don’t want to maintain things the way they are.

This is not the first time I have been the oddball in a koinonia – a group of believers who get together for support and fellowship. The last time I was so disturbed by right-wing political comments (calling Obama the antichrist and a socialist) that I dropped out of the group even though I genuinely liked the women. This time, I am trying to hang in there and love my friends despite our very different understandings of what it means to follow Christ.

Case in point: Last night, one of the women made an inscrutable comment in response to a question in our study book: How have you seen God use surprising people and circumstances to accomplish his will in this world? She said she heard that the current administration reads more scripture than any administration since JFK and his cabinet meetings start off with prayer.

I was not speechless, though it’s difficult for me to remember all my words when I am emotional about something. I did say, “There may be religious people at his meetings but I think he is a wicked man.” Another woman said, they say he recently became a Christian. I said, “I don’t believe it. If he were truly saved he would be remorseful and repentant about the things he has said and done. He would not denigrate people the way he does.”

For the past couple of years as I have watched Christians support the wicked man who now occupies the oval office, I have vainly tried to make the inscrutable scrutable. I’ve tried to understand why people who follow the moral teachings of Jesus are so willing to ignore the immorality and hatefulness of the president.

I can’t make sense of it.

I understand confirmation bias; we listen to the arguments that fit our worldview. I understand that people have fears for the future. I understand that people have certain ends in mind when they vote.

I don’t understand consequentialism – the idea that the ends justify the means. Christians wanted a man who would appoint a conservative judge to the Supreme Court so they were willing to ignore his wickedness. They struck a bargain with a bigot.

The problem with consequentialism is the collateral damage that comes with the means. Is the country more moral with a pathological liar in the white house? Are we any better at loving our neighbors – other nations – with a nationalist at the helm? Is it worth risking the right to free speech when the emperor cries out “fake news!” every time the press points out that he has no clothes? Are we better at protecting the needy with a selfish, greedy man shaping governmental policies?

Try as I might, I can’t make the inscrutable scrutable.

Image credit: Vincent van Gogh, Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington

via Daily Prompt: Inscrutable