Today at the Mission of Hope Worship Service, Tom Munckton shared with me and the rest of the congregation a very moving and inspiring definition of compassion…
Definition of Compassion given by Henri Nouwen
“The word compassion is derived from the Latin words pati and cum, which together mean ‘to suffer with.’ Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish.
Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to morn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears.
Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.”
Tom also shared…compassion means to get out of the boat of our current circumstances and get into the boats of those who are suffering (from C. Thomas Davis, Fields of the Fatherless).
I am praying tonight for God to give me a heart full of this kind of compassion…real compassion.
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