I was shopping for school supplies at Woolworth’s on McKnight Road in Pittsburgh, when a man got off the escalator and began a conversation with me. It was a pleasant encounter, though I wondered why he took the time to speak with me. Until, as he was walking away, I realized that it was my father.
I know that this sounds absorb to the reader, though for me, with autism, it is a daily venture – I do not recognize faces or remember names. When I watch a movie and a character appears at a café that I think I should know, I have to backtrack to discover when I was first introduced to him. When I read a novel, I have to keep a list and description of the characters, least I forget who they are.
I was born with Asperger’s, which is on the autism spectrum. Asperger’s means I have difficulty with interpersonal relationships. It wasn’t until my early 60s that I was diagnosed with this birth condition. Until then I only knew that I was “different” and life was very difficult.
Individuals, such as myself, who have a disability that causes life to be a daily struggle, an unknown struggle for those absent of that particular disability, which results in an inability to comprehend the daily trauma. This lack of understanding, of course, leads to judgment and indignity.
Because of my birth defect, compassion has become my guiding theological endeavor.
The Greek word splanchnitzomai, “to have compassion,” is solely reserved for Jesus. Whenever Jesus acted with compassion or spoke the word in his teaching it became the turning point in the life another, bringing reconciliation and restoration, wholeness and healing.
There are nine biblical references describing Jesus as a compassionate man. On three occasions Jesus used the word compassion as the pivotal event in a parable. Thus, with certainty, we know Jesus lived a compassionate life and allowed it to be the essence of his teaching.
The English word for compassion is derived from two Latin words, com “with” and pati “to suffer.” Compassion means “to suffer with.” It means total and complete solidarity with another individual in which his or her suffering becomes that of my own. The suffering of the afflicted one is transposed into the soul of the caregiver. The suffering of one can no longer be distinguished from the suffering of the other. I, and the other, have now become one and the same.
Compassion is a biblical word of immeasurable worth. It goes beyond “sympathy” which is a shared feeling. It encompasses more than “empathy” which is limited to a common frame of reference. It transcends “pity” which is hierarchical. Compassion is the integration of two lives, juxtaposed by trauma.
Judaism associate’s maternity with compassion. The Hebrew word for compassion rachamin is derived from rehem which means “womb” or “uterus.” If one becomes engaged in a compassionate act the womb – the sacrosanct nurturer of life – is pained. Compassion, for the Jewish community, expresses a feminine characteristic of God.
If you are to understand an individual who has a disability then you must “suffer with,” “identify with,” that person.