Chapter 6 - Ms. Ruth Ratliff

Chapter 6:  Conflict, Compassion and the Way of the Cross

By Ruth Ratliff

   Public life is not easy.  We’ve all heard, “If you’re going to be a public figure, you need a thick skin.”

   Or as my father, a school board member, once told me, “Never underestimate the small-mindedness of the public.”

 And, as Harry Truman advised: “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.”

   Is the harsh world of public life any place for nice people like Christians?  Parker Palmer not only says it is, but asserts that our Christian faith enables us to deal with the reality, the pains, frustrations and contradictions of public life. 

   Relationships in public life aren’t intimate ones; we should not expect them to generate the warmth and closeness we share with family and friends.  And, we must admit that even our intimate relationships are marred by, as Palmer says, “our pride, our egos, our desire to control others.”  But, all our relationships are opportunities for us to experience and express God’s love if we put that love at their centers.  “When we allow God’s love to mediate our relations, we place between us holy space,” Palmer writes.  “By putting God at the center of all relationships, Christianity opens the possibility of relations which are not close and warm yet can possess full value.” 

   In doing so, we will be following what Palmer calls the Way of the Cross.  When we embark on this Way, we offer compassion without expecting that it will be returned.  In fact, we know that we are likely at times to be hurt when our compassion is scorned or seems powerless to overcome the world’s hatred.  This is the crucifixion stage of the Way.  Yet, if we have faith in the ultimate power of God’s grace sustaining us and working through us, we will experience victory, resurrection.  We will be filled with new courage and strength to support us in offering compassion.  Thus, in Palmer’s words, “love leads to suffering leads to greater love.”

   Although Palmer warns us not to use intimacy as a standard for the relationships of public life, I think our intimate relationships can teach us something about the Way of the Cross.  For example, many of us find joy in witnessing a wedding, seeing a newly united couple filled with happiness and hope.  Yet we know that the love they have just declared will also bring suffering to each of them.  In the years to come, they will disappoint and hurt one another.  Each spouse will experience the pain of seeing the other wounded by the world, by illness and even by the other’s own self.  At the same time, we know that if their union is infused with God’s grace, their love will move through each instance  of suffering to emerge with new strength and depth.  And so, we rejoice as they begin their journey together, even as we recognize that it will include the Way of the Cross.

    Many of us, as spouses, family members and friends, are willing to travel the Way of the Cross in our personal relationships.  Do we have the courage, the love, the faith to walk the Way of the Cross in the relationships of public life?  In the word of the Celtic prayer, it is Christ – in mouth of friend and stranger -- who calls us to do so.  It is Christ -- behind me, before me, beside me -- who will walk with me