I met a Buddhist Monk this last week who said in all his time teaching inside prisons, he never once met a murderer or a rapist.
He further explained he’d met a person who had murdered. A person who had raped. He explained the difference by allowing us to sit with his words in a profound, elongated silence.
Lately, I’ve been studying the differences between the act and the actor and considering how we can strive to love all people but not love their actions.
I’m sick of all this judgment and disdain bubbling out of me, us, this collective American society. I’m sick of it not bubbling out of me, locked in my shoulders and souring my stomach and waking me up at 3 am.
Making compassion constant is the only thing that truly is constant.
My Christian friend always says, love the sinner, not the sin. How? Turn off the news? Hide in a forest monastery? Na.
I recently sat with a friend struggling to honor his father, a man whom he perceives to have caused great hurt in his life.
Is there a requirement to honor someone who made us?
Do we have to? Of course not.
But to be truly free?
What do you think?
Can we acknowledge the beautiful other parts of the same someone who hurt and wronged us?
Maybe the better question is, how do we?
I didn’t know how much my dad loved me until I learned how he loves. When I figured that out, I was blown away.
I quickly started noticing how people love.
Actions represent.
Love is a verb.
Right?
