What makes our enemies enemies?

Contemplation is the ability to see a whole world instead of a partial one. Contemplation is the awareness of the holy in everything. Contemplation is conscience co-creating. The problem is that the people are in peril and contemplation, it seems, is today at a premium.

The issues of our time call in a special way for contemplative consciousness. The simple truth is that in a world that is linked by a single camera, under the threat of destruction from a single trigger, drawing from a single resource pool, and ruled only by the male model, no one with integrity can ignore the call to contemplate the effects of all of this on creation and our own commitment to it.

"Hatred," the philosopher wrote, "is simply a slower form of suicide."

Isn't it time to contemplate what it is that makes our enemies enemies? And who decided it?

Who can contemplate poverty in affluence, power for profit, women as a class in oblivion throughout the world, or prejudices enthroned as morality? Who can contemplate all this with the compassionate eye of God and do nothing, say nothing, change nothing, stand for nothing?

But contemplation is not without cost. To see what should be instead of what is; to see what could be instead of what will be if things go on as they are; to see what is possible instead of probable; to be conscious and compassionate and courageous and constant about it, costs.

Yet the monastic literature of the ancients show us clearly what it takes to rise to heights of contemplative awareness.

The story is told of a young person who came to the monastery disillusioned with life but wanting to find a short cut to enlightenment, for fear that a hard, slow process of study and meditation would only lead to failure. And so the Elder said, "Ah, yes, there is a shorter way to enlightenment. I will put you to playing chess with one of our old sisters. Whichever one of you loses, I will cut off your head. If the old sister loses, she will wake up in Paradise. If you lose, since you have done nothing so far with your life, you will deserve it."

When the game began, the youth played for her life. The chessboard became her entire world; she was totally concentrated on it. And though the early stages of the game were a near equal struggle, the youth finally took the advantage and the old sister's position began to crumble. And then the young person saw the worn face of her opponent and its intelligence and its sincerity, and a wave of compassion came over her. And deliberately she began to make one blunder after another in her opponent's behalf until finally her own position was completely defenseless. And then the master leaned forward and upset the board. "There is no winner and no loser," the Elder said. "No head will fall here."

"Life requires of us only two things," the Elder said to the youth, "concentration on what is important and compassion for the other. You have just learned both. Pursue that spirit and enlightenment is sure."

––from WomanStrength: Modern Church, Modern Women, by Joan Chittister (Sheed and Ward)