A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice

Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice. This book was a gift from a dear friend, and what a gift it has turned out to be. I will always be mindful of the difference between climbing Jacob's Ladder and dancing Sarah's Circle. It is such a perfect metaphor for the lives we have built. It is especially poignant to have read this volume and finished it so close to the recent tragedies here in the US on 9/11/01. It makes me wonder exactly how much of the hate directed at our country is due to the Jacob's Ladder world we have created. It is high time that we paid attention to dancing instead of climbing.Matthew had so much to teach me about compassion - that it is not pity but celebration, not sentiment but making justice and doing works of mercy, and that it is not private or ego-centric but public. Then Matthew helps us to understand how the teachings in our culture, that of ever climbing - the ladders of success or acquisitions - and distancing ourselves from others and how those teachings separate us from compassion, can be a significant cause of pain in our world.Many of us know the song to which Matthew refers: We are climbing Jacob's Ladder / Soldiers of the Cross. We may not be familiar with the corollary to that song (sung to the same tune): We are Dancing Sarah's Circle / Sisters, Brothers, All. The message of this book - give up being "Soldiers of the Cross," and instead become "Sisters, Brothers, All," is definitely a message for our time.