“Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!” The words of the blind beggar from today’s Gospel echo in our hearts. How many times have we had the same prayer? ‘Let this suffering end!’, ‘See that I am perishing!’, ‘You can do all things, let this chalice pass from me!’, ‘Have mercy!’. When we ask our Lord for mercy or for pity, which can be seen in the case of the blind beggar, we are usually asking for our current misery to end: “Lord, please let me see.”
Furthermore, pity is typically associated with a slight air of condescension or superiority on behalf of the person who is offering it. For example, I imagine the “righteous” Pharisee pitying the tax collector, or I might pity a child who is screaming in the grocery store for cookies. I feel sorry for them (and probably the embarrassed mother too), but I remain far removed from the situation, potentially judging them for it.
There is nothing wrong with asking for pity from our Lord. In fact, it puts us right in our place. We are inferior, He will be judging us one day, and we need to acknowledge that in our prayer life through a humiliating prayer like this. Not only that, but He wants us to ask for freedom from our suffering as He wants us to ask Him for anything and everything we desire. This is especially evident as the blind beggar is far from the only one He relieves and heals in the Gospels.
Enter Compassion
Despite all that, I could not help but imagine the scene if the beggar’s request would have been different. What would it have been like if he did not ask for mere pity, but compassion? ‘Jesus, Son of David, have compassion for me’. From our handy dandy Latin roots, we know that compassion means ‘to suffer with ’or ‘to feel with ’(‘com’=with; ‘pati=to suffer/to feel). Compassion is not asking for suffering to end, but for someone to suffer with you. It’s not asking for a fix, but understanding.
Imagine what Jesus’ response might have been like to this request. Imagine Him taking on blindness for years – perhaps never knowing the face of His Blessed Mother, not being able to hold a job and provide for Himself, let alone His family and relatives. Then, imagine Him taking on the physical pains of that blindness – perhaps it was caused by an illness or there was some tragic accident. Imagine Him then sitting next to this man on the dusty, weather-beaten road, begging with him, day in and day out, His skin leathering under the sun, His belly being empty more often than full. Imagine Him not only being there while this man is going through all this, but Jesus actually going through it physically, emotionally, spiritually Himself. ‘Jesus, Son of David, have compassion for me!’, ‘Be with me!’, ‘Stay with me in my suffering and never leave me!’, ‘Understand me’, ‘See me!’
Is this not what Jesus offers us through His incarnation, through His passion, and even more intimately when we receive Him in the Eucharist? He does not just offer us pity, though we surely need that. He is not just that friend who wants to fix it, offering a million solutions that never seem to satisfy the ache in our hearts. No! He sits with us in our suffering, holds us, lets us cry it out, and even cries with us. Pity does not cry with the person. Compassion does. And sometimes that’s really all we want – someone to cry with us, someone to get it.
Pity Goes One Way, Compassion Goes Both
An important part of this distinction between pity and compassion is that compassion is the only thing we can offer back to our Lord. We are not in a position to give Him pity, at least not from a place of any kind of superiority or power to fix it. However, we can offer our sufferings to Him. And in this way lovingly suffer with Him, not just in His passion, but over all the sins and tragedies of the world that His Sacred Heart grieves to see. No, we cannot have pity on our Lord and Savior; that seems a contradiction of sorts. But we can have compassion. Whenever I look at the startling image of the Sacred Heart with the words under it ‘Sic Deus Dilexit Mundum ’(‘For God so loved the world’), I see His deep longing for nothing other than our compassion.
Pray for Both
How we pray changes our hearts. When we ask for pity, we acknowledge in all humility that we need Him as Savior and Lord. But when we ask for compassion, we acknowledge we need Him as spouse, lover, most intimate friend. We open ourselves more fully to receiving the graces He wants to give us in our suffering. Namely, deeper unity with Him. We need to ask for both, but how much more often we forget to ask for compassion when we are overwhelmed by our present sufferings. Let us never forget to ask for His compassion. So that, we can console His Heart in asking for what He so desires to give. Also, so that we can know the deep consolation that He is there with us as we await His pity and mercy. And, so that we better compassionate His Heart in return.
[Readings: 1 Maccabees 1:10-15, 41-43, 54-57, 62-63; Luke 18:35-43]
