Through Their Eyes
Indianapolis First Friends Quaker Meeting
Pastor Bob Henry
September 11, 2022
Good morning, Friends and welcome to Light Reflections. Today is Kick Off Sunday at First Friends, which means we are starting up all our fall programming.
The scripture for this morning is Galatians 6:2-5 from The Voice translation.
Shoulder each other’s burdens, and then you will live as the law of the Anointed teaches us. Don’t take this opportunity to think you are better than those who slip because you aren’t; then you become the fool and deceive even yourself. Examine your own works so that if you are proud, it will be because of your own accomplishments and not someone else’s. Each person has his or her own burden to bear and story to write.
American naturalist, essayist, poet, and philosopher Henry David Thoreau was on to something very crucial for our time when he posed this query,
“Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other’s eyes for an instant?”
Sit with that query for a moment.
“Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other’s eyes for an instant?”
For several months now, I have been noticing a common theme rearing its head in the books, articles, and blogs I have been reading. Even while listening to NPR a week or so ago, the commentator mentioned in an interview that our world is currently deficient in this important aspect, and she was pondering where it had gone and how it would more fully return to the public square.
As I began to do my research for this kickoff Sunday and for this fall sermon series, I realized this common theme has a great deal to do with religion and the Church - and overtime has been relegated to the back seat or back burner needing to return and reclaim its place within our faith and communities for the sake of our own wellbeing.
So, what is this common theme and aspect that is lacking, missing, or being neglected?
It is empathy.
I believe empathy is a gift that enables us to take the perspective of another, to see the world as Thoreau says, “through their eyes,” and to deeply connect with them in a way that wouldn’t be possible without this special gift.
Also, empathy is a beautiful gift we all have access to. It enables us to see and hear echoes of others in our selves. It is in this way that we come to understand what may or may not be in our own experience, but which allows us to relate to, appreciate, and even feel compassion for others through the deep knowing and connection that occurs when we really listen to their experiences.
And all of this is to happen without judgment (maybe the hardest aspect these days), which allows for a deep connection to occur and begins the long journey to true and sustaining peace.
Susan Lanzoni in her article “A Short History of Empathy,” says, “The word [empathy] was introduced in the early 1900s as a translation for the German word Einfühlung. Empathy is a combination of two Greek words, “em” and “pathos,” which together mean “in feeling.”
Thus, without empathy, we could live, work side-by-side, even worship with other people, and remain as clueless about their inner selves and feelings as we are about those of strangers at a concert or shopping at Target.
Empathy isn’t just the catalyst for closeness and positive social behavior, it should also help us put on our internal brakes when we are behaving badly and becoming aware of the pain we’re causing our neighbors.
Early Quakers were very interested in empathy. In T. Vail Palmer’s wonderful book, Face to Face: Early Quaker Encounters with the Bible, Palmer makes the case that a deep valuing of empathy played a major role in early Quakers’ interpretation of the Bible. He says,
Friends have developed explicit practices for fostering empathy, because even though humans have a capacity for empathy, that does not mean we necessarily pay attention to it. Quaker practices like “listening beyond words” combine with empathy to open the way for people to develop deep insights into each other. Empathetic interactions build connections between people at levels much deeper than rational judgments and accumulated information.
I think T. Vail Palmer’s words hark a call to us Quakers to pay attention once again to our empathy. And this is not an easy call and will take some personal work.
In USA Today columnist and senior political analyst for CNN, Kristen Power’s important book, Saving Grace: Speak Your Truth, Stay Connected, and Learn to Coexist with People Who Drive You Nuts. (That title alone drew me in), she says,
“It is wonderful to be empathetic, and we need more empathy in the world. But what many of us call empathy is actually just an open-door policy to toxic behavior that leaves us burned out.”
Therefore, to reclaim empathy, we will need to take some time to look at it from several different angles and delve deeper into what it means for us as Quakers, Christians, and as human beings. This is my plan over the next several Sundays.
So, this morning, I want to begin with going back to an article that caught my attention about a year ago by Lauren Graham writer for the FTC Institute. I think she addresses well why it is so important to pay attention to empathy and how easily it can misguide us and create toxic behavior within the Church and in our communities. Lauren says,
“Even in our best efforts to display…love, we often find ourselves struggling with the practical outpouring of empathy in our day to day lives. We may deeply desire to show empathy towards others but find ourselves lost as to what that looks like. We may be well-intentioned in our efforts but find ourselves stumbling in our relationships, many times unbeknownst to us.”
I don’t know about you, but for the past few years I have definitely felt lost in regard to being empathetic to certain groups of people – and social media, the news networks, and the polarization of the world have not made it any easier.
Lauren helps us unpack this by giving us six signs we are not doing empathy well. She begins with:
1. We only give empathy when it is convenient to us. The truth of the matter is that if we are doing empathy right, it will cost us in some way, shape, or form. It will cost us energy, time, emotional stability, comfort, and so many other conveniences.
Empathy by nature is inconvenient because it demands that we step out of our own world and into the world of another human. And if we are honest with ourselves, many times we simply do not want to pay the price of stepping out of our own world.
This is exactly what Jesus was emphasizing when he shared the parable of the Good Samaritan, who was joyous in inconveniencing himself in order to “love his neighbor.” It was empathy that moved him to take action. We will be looking more at what Jesus had to say in the coming weeks.
2. When the other person offends us or makes a mistake, we withhold empathy. We have all heard horror stories about people turning their backs on friends at times when they were needed most. We are very willing to be empathetic until we are confronted with human messiness... It is at this point where many times empathy tends to go out the window.
I have been sickened by families and friendships who have withheld empathy over their religious beliefs, political party lines, wearing masks, understanding of racial history, financial situations, even over choices or beliefs about sexual orientations and gender identity issues. Most of the time, this arises because we are unwilling to enter the messiness and actually listen to and understand each other – which is a key aspect of empathy.
3. We look for opportunities to “educate” the other person in the conversation. If we are looking for opportunities to assert ourselves as an expert or a guide, we are likely not expressing empathy but arrogance. Empathy is not an avenue to exalt ourselves but a road on which we die to ourselves in service of our neighbor.
We may need to explore this more, as I know this one is quite evident in our world, today – especially with the access we all have to a wealth of knowledge on the internet. Lauren’s next point is similar:
4. We try to fix the problem instead of listening intently for how the person feels. If we are giving another person a how-to guide in order to fix the issue they are facing, we have completely missed the point of empathy.
Attempting to fix the situation is not empathy and oftentimes leads to foolish speech as we have not really heard or understood the other person in order to actually be helpful in any way.
Please hear me on this: Empathy is being willing to sit in the pain and suffering of another person without trying to change it, lighten it, get rid of it, fix it, or drown it out.
5. We turn someone else’s vulnerability into an opportunity to draw attention to ourselves. Empathy is not about us, folks. To be empathetic is to sit in the seat of another human and look at the world through their eyes (as Thoreau said).
This requires that we abandon any efforts to put the spotlight back on ourselves. This is not easy, and often abused within the church and our world, today. This means, empathy seeks to understand the suffering of the person in front of us not in an effort to play the comparison game with our own stories of suffering.
And finally, one of the most important signs:
6. We are not willing to challenge our own beliefs, assumptions, or convictions in hearing another’s story.
I truly believe that a large reason why empathy is immensely difficult for many of us is that in order to do it well it would require a certain amount of risk.
It is a risk to be empathetic towards others. It is a risk because to do so would mean that we would put ourselves in a position to be challenged, to be proven incorrect or false.
Obviously, I am giving us a lot to chew on in this first sermon, but we will continue to unpack some of these ideas in the coming weeks. As a review and an opportunity to ponder as we head into waiting worship, let me read through Lauren’s signs that we are not doing empathy well, one last time, but this time I will turn them into our queries for this morning:
1. Do I only give empathy when it is convenient to me?
2. When other people offend me or makes a mistake, do I withhold empathy?
3. Do I look for opportunities to “educate” the other people in a conversation?
4. Do I try to fix the problem instead of listening intently for how the person feels?
5. Do I turn someone else’s vulnerability into an opportunity to draw attention to myself?
6. Am I not willing to challenge my own beliefs, assumptions, or convictions in hearing another’s story?