“Being overly empathic is dangerous.”
My heart bleeds for the earth, the (human) world, and the church. Day after day I am struck by the issues, incidents, and ailments which characterize our bleeding world. As my custom is to fixate, obsess, and resolve, I pour my passion straight into these vessels and am surprised (somehow) to find myself emptier than before. I want to charge the issues straight-on, meet them face-to-face, deal with them directly and for good.
But “being overly empathic is dangerous,” writes clinical psychologist and spiritual theologian Robert Wicks. Pouring yourself into every vessel leaves you with nothing left to pour, and perhaps more importantly, nothing left to drink. My heart bleeds for many things, but if I don’t pay attention, I’ll bleed out.
Not that I am anywhere near the point of “bleeding out.” Rather, I am learning of the danger of empathy, too direct, too sustained.
Much of my empathy is for friends, family, and others who have been harmed, sometimes irrecoverably, by the church. Much of my bleeding is for those who’ve been sliced by Christianity, and who, for right reasons, don’t care to “come back.” I bleed for those who have become disillusioned with what the church, in many places, has become. I bleed for those who feel hoodwinked, bewitched, or exploited, who feel that whatever the church is, to them it just isn’t right.
There are so many things to bleed for that some days I worry I’ll bleed out.
Before accepting the call to pastor this wonderful New England church, I spent most of my time not in the present but rather in the past, the ancient past.
For some inexplicable reason, I became enamored with antiquity, Mediterranean antiquity at first, Egyptian antiquity at last. My academic interests concern not the mainstream urban élite Christians who lived in Alexandria (a bustling coastal metropolis in northern Egypt). I was less interested in the patriarchs, the bishops, the institutional “kingpins” in the city. Rather, I became enamored with the countless countryside Christians struggling to eke out a living in the unforgiving Egyptian wilderness. I became interested, in other words, in the monks.
Not all rural Christians in Roman Egypt (1st-5th century AD) were monks, of course, but many of the writings bequeathed to us from this region and period are from (or about) monastics, figures such as Antony (ca. 254-356), Pachomius (ca. 292-346), Amoun (ca. 290-347), Shenoute (ca. 348-465), and others.
These are likely names you’ve never heard, yet their legacies live on, influencing countless Christians across Africa, Asia, Europe, and beyond.
During the third and fourth centuries, Christianity in Egypt became increasingly institutional and politicized. Among the patriarchs and bishops in Alexandria especially, the history of Christianity largely becomes the history of Alexandrian politics, and the politics of the Roman Empire at large. Figures such as Athanasius of Alexandria began to wield considerable political power in the Empire as Constantine pronounced Christianity the official and state “religion” (ask me some other time why this word is in quotation marks) of the Empire.
As urban elite clergy gained political influence and Christianity was blended with statecraft, we see others far off in the hinterland embracing lives of profound discipline and peace. One such person was Antony, whose monastic life is artfully illuminated in the Life of St. Antony by (the aforementioned) Athanasius of Alexandria.
Antony is often viewed (whether rightfully or not) as the founder of Egyptian monasticism, setting the stage for the discipline that would define Christian existence across continents and across millennia. Antony’s life is nothing short of fantastical, includes bouts with demons, hyenas, and centaurs; days without food or water; letters from the Emperor himself; miraculous feats of healing and knowledge, and the like. The tale reads like the Odyssey, the Gospel of Mark, or the legends of Beowulf, King Arthur, and others.
As I reflect upon the myriad ailments which plague our world today, and as I try to bleed for them in a way that doesn’t drain me, I find solace and hope in St. Antony.
Joining the monks of the Egyptian countryside gives me the remoteness I need to reflect thoughtfully, carefully, and tenderly upon the countless issues which face our world. To join the monks is not to stop bleeding but to slow the bleeding, to clean the wound but not heal it, to discipline my empathic engagement with the world.
The monks present for us a truly alternative way of being in the world. By detaching themselves from the structures, systems, and webs of influence, which often hunt, capture, and devour our souls, they display a resilience and composure completely unparalleled in the world today. By standing outside the stream of social progress, political machination, economic locomotion, the monks of the Egyptian countryside find something true to say, something real to give.
Hear me: I am not advocating aloof detachment from the pressing social issues which face our world. Rather, I am claiming that unfettered, unabated, and unregulated empathy, may leave us empty and bewildered, left with nothing true to say, and nothing real to give.
Antony, on the other hand, through his life of discipline, detachment, dissent, lived himself to a place where others could only dream of being: a place of clarity, peace, a place of holiness.
Toward the end of his Life of St. Antony, Athanasius of Alexandria writes the following:
“It was as if a physician had been given by God to Egypt. For who in grief met Antony and did not return rejoicing? Who came mourning for his dead and did not put off his sorrow? Who came in anger and was not converted to friendship? Who when tempted by demons, came to him and did not find rest? And who came troubled with doubts and did not get quietness of mind?
For not from writings, nor from worldly wisdom, nor through any art, was Antony renowned, but solely from his piety towards God... For even if the monks work secretly, even if they wish to remain in obscurity, the Lord shows them as lamps to lighten all, that those who hear may know that the precepts of God are able to make men prosper and be zealous in the path of virtue.”
Let us bleed, then. Antony certainly did. But let us discipline our bleeding with quiet love, care, and devotion, letting God do something real through us.
Jonah Bissell
Associate Pastor