Compassion and the evils of the armchair

Peter Costello is fond of speaking about Christian values. It has puzzled me. What are these Christian values exactly, and do they exclude the values of other religions? Are they exclusive to Christianity alone?

In consideration of these questions I decided to do a little research. At first I looked for scriptures or commentary that supported the protection of one’s own borders, against the strangers and the orphans and the widows. But all I found were scriptures that spoke of compassion. Take Matthew 31 for instance.

Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.

Apparently the people were surprised.

... Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in?

And Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me”.

But the story takes a troubling turn. It continues with Jesus telling the other group who stood around him to “Go, with your curse of eternal fires upon you”.

The reason for this curse?

For I was hungry and you never gave me food, I was thirsty and you never gave me drink, I was a stranger and you never made me welcome.

And when the people complained that they had never refused Jesus these things, he responded, “in so far as you neglected to do this to one of the least of these, you neglected to do it to me”.

So I understand now that when we treat unfortunate people with compassion, it is as if we are treating God with compassion, and it is transformed into salvation.

Having been a regular visitor to Villawood Detention Centre, I presume this idea doesn’t have universal application, and I felt a bit nervous about the “curse” of which Jesus had spoken.

Nevertheless I continued on in my research. I was looking for evidence that suggested that we must preserve our wealth above all else. I remembered how encouraging Peter Costello was at Hillsong not long ago, and was keen to find evidence of the prosperity gospel that has caught the imagination of so many.

I was looking for the value of nurturing suspicion without reason, or passing judgment without mercy, of ensuring our continued comfort despite growing global poverty. But it was quite disappointing. Jesus seems to think that it is more difficult for a rich man to get to heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. And giving is good too.

Give, and there will be gifts for you: a full measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be poured into your lap; because the amount you measure out is the amount you will be given. (Lk.6)

Looking around at the level of need in the world, it’s all a bit worrying. I could almost get the impression that Peter Costello thought Christian values means “talking” about them. But I am sure that he would have read in James, “You see now that it is by doing something good, and not only believing, that a man is justified”.

Peter’s brother Tim doesn’t seem to talk about Christian values very much. He just seems to do a lot of good for people who need it. And I’m sure those desperate countries to which he travels are not particularly comfortable.

Aldous Huxley wrote an essay on the evil of the arm chair, stating that when we began to lounge like kings, we came to believe it was our entitlement. Comfort is a sort of forgetting. Often it is the memory of our suffering that leads us to acts of compassion. Perhaps it’s a bit too comfortable down there in Canberra.

Indulgence can become a substitute for justice, and our comfort and lifestyle become the values for which we fight. With our growing egocentricity comes the illusion that one’s own environment is taken to be the world itself. Such a parochial way of life is bent on the idol of security, which is meant to keep all suffering at bay.

And with this idol of security, we maintain our comfort by not feeling the suffering of others. We are left with pity, not true compassion. True compassion depends on imagination. It leads not to charity, but to justice. It extends to all human beings, all creatures, and creation itself.

In the last talk he gave, two hours before his death, Thomas Merton said, “the whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all living beings, which are part of one another and all involved with one another”. All through the scriptures it speaks of a compassionate God. If that is the case, then God suffers when we suffer. And to alleviate God’s suffering, we are required to do acts of compassion.

I have certainly enjoyed this quest to discover what Christian values are. Since I am a Jewish woman, the term didn’t mean too much to me. I am glad to say that I didn’t simply examine Peter Costello’s actions to give me the clues. That would have been rather misleading.

In fact, oddly, it seems that there is very little difference between what I understand as Christian values and any other religious values. Why don’t you just substitute the term for “compassion”? I think it says what you are trying to say, Mr Costello, I hope so - and an added benefit is that it’s a term that everyone understands.