4th Week of Lent: Connected in God’s Compassion

This is the next article in a series of Suggested Lenten Practices for 2010.

Lent 2010: A Journey into the Compassion of God

Sometimes we need to be reminded that God’s compassion is for all – and that we are all connected in the compassion of God, even when we feel disconnected from each other. Compassion may be defined as “a passionate way of living born of an awareness of the interconnectedness of all creatures by reason of their common Creator…Compassion is our kinship with the universe and the universe’s Maker; it is the action we take because of that kinship.” (Matthew Fox) As Christians, we are charged with being “ambassadors of reconciliation.” We can “dig deep” into the compassion of God to help us be reconciled and reconcilers when we can’t find the desire, strength or resolve in ourselves.

Spiritual Practice: All the community is invited to a common spiritual practice, in addition to whatever you have chosen to do individually.

• The father lets go of judgment, pride, and problems to celebrate the wayward son’s home-coming. Jesus eats with the outcasts and calls us to be ambassadors of reconciliation. Consider: Who am I unwilling to embrace? In what ways do we individually and communally carry on the work of reconciliation?
• God’s compassion is love’s embrace, accepting us as we are, even as we are challenged to live with greater love and integrity. God’s compassion provides a space where healing, forgiveness, reconciliation and fullness of life can happen – for all of us. Relying on the compassion of God and recognizing our interconnectedness with all people, this week take a specific step toward reconciliation with an individual or group with whom you have differences.

4th Week of Lent – Justice Intersections, for further reflection:

A particular perspective: Those who stand in hope of justice and mercy... Imprisoned criminals might hear this week's gospel with a keen sense of what it means to have trespassed against the rights and person of another... and to long for reconciliation, mercy and pardon, even when it seems most distant.

• Scriptural Reference: Rdg 2: God has given us the ministry of reconciliation Gospel: the poignant story of the one who longs for undeserved mercy, and the God who longs to give it
• Church Teaching/Faith Connection: The call to merciful ministry to the imprisoned... our own prison ministry
• Spiritual Practice of Compassionate Solidarity...Take these concrete realities into prayer, through use of the imagination...imagine the physical and emotional experience of an imprisoned person longing for reconciliation, mercy and pardon... Pray in solidarity with those who at this moment are suffering in this way.
• Intersection with my own journey: Do I carry within me a sense of shame which blinds me to the possibilities of reconciliation? Do I carry within me a sense of righteous anger that blinds me to the joy of mercy and forgiveness?