Compassionate Somedays
I have a strong dislike for “Compassionate Somedays.” You know what I mean: those noble scenarios that run through our minds wherein we’re finally selfless, finally loving, finally caring for the people who are in need rather than pretending their needs don’t exist. It’s far easier to imagine that we will care for some hypothetical person at some hypothetical point in time with some hypothetical need rather than this particular person in this particular moment with this particular need.
In the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) two men, a Priest and a Levite, ignore a man who has fallen among robbers and is lying half dead on the side of the road. Perhaps they were entertaining their own compassionate somedays as they walked past, reassuring themselves that they really were compassionate, for, after all think of all the good they would do “someday.” When they were finally less busy, had more money, or whatever.
I’m reminded of an Annie Dillard quote from her book, The Writing Life: “how we live our days is how we live our lives.”
There will be no compassionate tomorrows unless we begin to live compassionately today.
-Mike.