Love as Dis-possession

In our Sat discussion we asked, "Where does compassion come from?" The three parables discussed (The Good Samaritan, Prodigal Son, Rich Man and Lazarus) all have a theme of awakening to true love, which includes compassion and forgiveness. Where does it come from?

If eros is possessive love, agape love, including compassion, is dis-possessive love. It is essentially the reaction to dis-possessive evil. "The assumption of another's suffering as one's own entails a radical decentering of the self, and putting at risk of the self, in the free re-enactment of the dispossessed state of those who suffer." Oliver Davies, A Theology of Compassion, at p. 17. This movement (or need for movement) can be seen in all three parables noted above. Mr. Davies cites Etty Hillesum and Edith Stein, both who decided to share in the physical fate of the Jewish victims of the Shoah.

Mr. Davies points out that compassion is recognized as a central element in a society:

The principle of self-denying or kenotic love, of which compassion is a particularly radical manifestation, appears to touch all levels of human existence and, indeed, to make harmonious social existence possible. Without such a principle of self-emptying for the sake of the other, enacted in some degree by a myriad people in countless different ways, most human societies could not keep at bay the violent and selfish tendencies of the human spirit. Despite all the ambiguities of human socialization and motication, the fact that a multitude of ordinary individuals do repeatedly subordinate their own interests to those of another in everyday situations of life can be construed as the very principle of civilization. . . . Such acts of exceptional self-risking love, motivated by compassion for another individual, constitute for many a point of unsurpassable meaning.

Ibid. at p. 21. It thus appears that sacrificial love takes its place at the top of the scale of values, in both secular and Christian traditions. Here there is a point of agreement. Dis-interested love is of the highest interest and value.

How different from the point of view expressed in an earlier post in which the most insignificant desire of an "actual" human being outweighs that of a "potential" human life, whose expectation is decreed to be zero. In fact, a "potential" human being becomes actual in relation to its mother and others who love him (her). As Davies puts it:

The very earliest contact of a child with the 'world' or non-self is in the form of the mother, or principal carer, who embraces the child in the field of an all-encompassing relation. . . . An open I-Thou relation of self to self provides the existential condition for the emergence of personhood. A child is constantly treated by adults as an adult human being in the making, with all the rights and privileges of adult personhood, and so an existential space is created into which the child can grow as a process of self-determination in personhood. The essence of self, as person, originates in the mutuality of persons therefore, a relation which is animated and quickened by the creative recognition of personhood by one self of another.

Ibid at p. 21. There is no point at which actuality emerges. All is potency moving into actuality, at whatever age, it seems. And so, rather than to be based on selfish autonomy, our social outlook should be founded on agape love, which is altruism and compassion. Only by such means are human beings made. And human beings are being made (or unmade) from the moment we experience them, born or unborn, young or old.

As Pope Benedict says, the way of love is love. To learn to love, love.

Listen to Kris Kristofferson, "Why Me Lord?"