Armchair Empathy

Daily Devotion - April 18

I will send a brief message each day
while we are pausing gathering in person.
- Kara

I read an article this morning about "coronavirus shaming."  Apparently there are facebook groups dedicated to posting photos of those violating social distancing rules and calling them out.  George Stephanopoulos, J-Lo, and Chris Cuomo have all been publicly railed for perceived transgressions.
In my neighborhood group there was a post recently about a man who yelled at someone about to cross a street to stop and screamed that his wife was pregnant and the pedestrian needed to stay 27 feet back from them.  This person was so shocked and felt so bad, that when they shared their "please let's not yell at each other in public" email, the group rallied around the poor pedestrian and email-yelled at the yeller for his yelling.  One person reminded the rest of the tension we are all under, and the reality of mental health strain in this time, and we all simmered down a bit.

But I can feel it in myself.  Scanning the sidewalk, getting ready to move to the middle of the road if the people coming the other way don't move first...and does that group seem related? Or are they violating social distancing rules?

What about the roofers next door?  And why are the store clerks not wearing masks when the rest of us are? And don't the parents of those children care about the older people they are letting them run right up too? Oh, they are their grandparents? So are they staying in the same house then? Or are they being put at risk?

It's one small step from exercising judgment to judging others.

And then yesterday, the protesters! Oh! The protestors! A perfect target for our coronavirus shaming! Side by side they marched in front of the governor's house, spraying their aerosol and droplets all over each other!  For breaking the social compact and putting us all at risk, what should be done to those (insert insult here)?

It's a tiny jump from feeling threatened to threatening others.

It was only a matter of time in our call-out culture before we found a way to move from solidarity back to siloing.  Now we are re-entrenching into our comfortable foxholes and we've turned our guns back on each other.

Fear is a powerful voice.
Motivated by the needs for security, safety, cooperation, collaboration, even by the belief that we all belong to each other, a natural emotional response to the perception of someone undermining those things is anger, frustration, rage.

We sink deeper into the way of fear when we let those feelings turn into the action of dehumanizing those who don't seem to be upholding humanity in the way we would like. It is easier to judge and dismiss others than to stay conscious of our connection.

Those people don't care at all about public health!  
Those people don't care at all about saving our economy!
Which camp are you in? Who is your enemy?
Let's turn all this helpless worry into powerful war.

Deep breath. Time for a reminder.
We all belong to each other. Period.
We all belong to God. Full stop.
Here is our chance to practice armchair empathy.

It goes like this:
We are all in this together.
This is a long thing with no clear end in sight. That is terrifying.
For some, it means following the rules and trying to do our best to help out however we can.
For some it means getting sick, losing loved ones, battling disease, saying goodbye.
For some it means going to work and putting ourselves in harms way everyday.
For some it means facing the very real prospect of losing our home.
Some are already scared of not being able to feed our children.  Some have spent the actual last dollar we have.

None are better or worse humans. None are more deserving or less so. None are exempt from impact.  We are all in this together.

This is not a clash of ideology - though it is that, and can be played that way, certainly.  It's not political either - though it sure is being used politically.

This is humanity. Scared, worried, sad, desperate, frustrated humanity.  All of us. Together. Being impacted each however we are being impacted, and trying to find our way through however we are finding our way through.

Every act is an attempt to meet a need. Some acts are tragic expressions of unmet needs.  But the needs themselves? Those are beautiful and important. And importantly, we all share those.

When the Way of Fear gets louder, we turns to they, and they become competition, threat, enemy, other.
But the truth is still true:
We are in this together, we are siblings in need, we are co-journeyers through this scary terrain.

Whether we are the reliable rule-abiders, the ambling along ambivalent, or the panicking picketers, we still belong to each other, and we still belong to God.
Our way back to that truth is through empathy.  Listening to the feelings, and wondering about the needs underneath restores humanity.

One final word about empathy, and that is this: empathy begins with self-empathy.  We need to acknowledge and receive our own humanity in order to recognize and feel for others.  If we are so overwhelmed by fear, or caught in unacknowledged anger, it's impossible to feel what might be going on for someone else.

Nobody is doing this perfectly. Some are doing things we completely disagree with, or can't understand, or wont accept.  We ourselves are messing up.  We are all longing for things to be right, to feel right, and they mostly just don't. It's uncomfortable. It's hard.
For everyone.

But we all belong to each other. And we all belong to God.
And we have this unique and important chance to practice self-empathy and empathy for each other.  To imagine our way into each other's experience.  To remember our belonging. To return to reality.


CONNECTING RITUAL:

Perhaps, tonight before we go to bed, whatever time that is in each of our homes, we might pause, reflect, and pray in this way, and so join our hearts:
 Ground me in the belonging that holds us, God.
Return me to the source of my being.
Help me see as you see.
Help me hear what you hear.
Help me act from truth and not from fear.
Help me hold myself and others with compassion.
Give me rest and peace this night,
and wake me to a new day ready
to begin belonging again.
Amen.