A Teacher's Compassion

Compassion is such an awesome thing to behold. As public educators, we see and experience a lot of heartbreak - homelessness and all forms of abuse by those who are supposed to love and nurture only skim the surface. So many children have so much to overcome in terms of tragedy and abuse, and most often these are the children that act out their pain and brokenness. Perhaps ashamedly so, they are also the most challenging students to like, because they are more often than not the greatest obstacle to the teacher's ability to present the lesson into which they poured their creativity and heart. They are more often than not the greatest obstacle to truly motivated learners' ability to learn.  Continual interruption,  distraction, and  sabotage are the manifestations of so many children acting out their emotional lives each day. They have a way of bringing the emotional storm that lives in them everywhere they go. 

It's an amazing sight, though, when I have the opportunity to see a teacher live out their compassion. The word 'compassion' is derived from two Latin roots that literally mean 'suffering with.' It's not the same thing as empathy, which is to feel another's pain. Rather it means to be with another - at their side and in the midst of their chaos and pain - it means to live life with them in the storm and the ruins of their suffering, not simply watching it from the sidelines, not even when such observation is full of heartfelt emotion.

When I see teachers live their compassion - when I am a witness to their labor of making sure these children are full participants in the social and academic life of the classroom -  when i see them embrace the losses that living in the storm necessarily brings, I am so moved. When I see the healing and life-giving work they do daily - when I see their diligence in taking all the heartbreak and social ills of our society and labor to transform it all into a future that holds promise for everyone in their care - when I see their compassion, my faith is increased. It makes me wonder in what ways other professions provide such opportunity to live out the gospel message of compassion.