Real Care is Not Ambiguous: The Loaves and Fishes are Not Dead

“Real care is not ambiguous” thus said Henri Nouwen and yet the word itself can suggest a certain amount of ambiguity. When someone says they will take care of something or someone it can sound almost threatening, there is certainly a sense of power over another in play, in phrase “I will take care of it, or I will take care of them.” This is not real care. Real care is about relationship; real care is about empathy; real care is about love. In this sense “real care is not ambiguous.”

I think one of the saddest and loneliest phrases, you will ever hear in the English language is, “I don’t care”. Who amongst us can say that they have never uttered them? If not out loud, so that others could hear them, at least inwardly to themselves. I’ve said it. I said it many years ago and later denied doing so. I said it though and regretted it immediately. It was at a moment in my life when I had sunk so far into the pain of my lost little self that I did not care anymore. I was in hell and the uttering of those words proved it at that moment in time.

Thankfully, although at times I do feel weariness towards aspects of life, it has been many years since I did not care; it has been many years since I experienced the pain and loneliness of indifference.

There’s another phrase along this theme, which I often hear spoken, “I don’t care what people think of me.” Now while I think I understand what people mean by this, that they are no longer ruled by the views of others, what matters is how they see themselves, there is something in this phrase that still bothers me. I never want to reach the point where I do not care at all what people think of me. I never want to, once again, experience indifference. While I am not ruled by the views of others, it matters to me what they believe. I care a lot.

As a child I was considered overly sensitive, that I felt too much and that I took things personally. While it was thought of as a likeable quality, I know it was seen as a serious handicap too. I remember my stepfather telling me I needed to toughen up and he certainly tried to in ways that were not healthy. All this really led to was me closing part of my humanity down. This did lead to a sense of indifference at some later stages of my life which led to some horrific feelings of loneliness, isolation and disconnection. Thankfully I eventually saw the truth of this and through love I began to connect and care again. This seeming blight became an asset as I was able to care once more. It wasn’t so much that I lost the sensitivity, that I felt less, it was more that I recognised that these feelings were not about me. I took things less personally and it was this that allowed me to begin to serve, to minister.

To minister is to serve and to serve is to care. It is about connection it is about relationship it’s about bringing that loving space alive. I learnt this through the example given to me by John Midgley when he came and tried to be with both me and others during an horrific time in our lives. John couldn’t heal or change anything. He was as powerless as we were, but he was able to be with us in our shared powerlessness and somehow in this space the healing power held us together. An example I will never forget. It is something I have been thinking of again these last couple of years I have become more involved in helping to develop ministers.

To truly care is to connect, to relate, to be a part of something, it is not a power relationship, it is intimate and it is mutual. It is empathy. This is heaven, this is love, this is what it means to care. This is what it means to turn to as opposed to turn away despite the pain, fear and confusion. This is courage. To care takes courage, it comes from the heart, it is the heart alive and on fire. To not care is the way of the coward; to not care is a frozen state, indifference requires a frozen heart.

I have heard hell described in many ways, what it means to be living in a state of hell. I think the most accurate explanation of hell, is that it is indifference. It is a sense of disconnection from the feelings and concerns of others. Hell is indifference. To live in hell is to be indifferent to sufferings of others. Dante’s Inferno described it thus.

Extract from Dante Alighieri’s “The Divine Comedy” Inferno (Hell), Canto III

ARGUMENT.—Dante, following Virgil, comes to the gate of Hell; where, after having read the dreadful words that are written thereon, they both enter. Here, as he understands from Virgil, those were punished who had passed their time (for living it could not be called) in a state of apathy and indifference both to good and evil. Then, pursuing their way, they arrive at the river Acheron; and there find the old ferryman Charon, who takes the spirits over to the opposite shore; which, as soon as Dante reaches, he is seized with terror, and falls into a trance.

Hell is indifference. Hell is not fire but in actual fact a frozen state, a state where a person no longer cares and has grown cold towards, others, towards life itself.

Here’s a story depicting the difference between Heaven and Hell, from the Zen Buddhist Tradition. I have shared it before. It’s one of those stories you hear different versions of in many traditions.

Once upon a time, in a temple nestled in the misty end of south hill, lived a pair of monks. One old and one young.
“What are the differences between Heaven and Hell?” the young monk asked the learned master one day.
“There are no material differences,” replied the old monk peacefully.
“None at all?” asked the confused young monk.
“Yes. Both Heaven and Hell look the same. They all have a dining hall with a big hot pot in the centre in which some delicious noodles are boiled, giving off an appetising scent,” said our old priest. “The size of the pan and the number of people sitting around the pot are the same in these two places.”
“But oddly, each diner is given a pair of meter-long chopsticks and must use them to eat the noodles. And to eat the noodles, one must hold the chopsticks properly at their ends, no cheating is allowed,” the Zen master went on to describe to our young monk.
“In the case of Hell, people are always starved because no matter how hard they try, they fail to get the noodles into their mouths,” said the old priest.
“But isn't it the same happens to the people in Heaven?” the junior questioned.
“No. They can eat because they each feed the person sitting opposite them at the table. You see, that is the difference between Heaven and Hell,” explained the old monk.


In the story “Heaven and Hell” appear exactly the same and yet they are experienced oh so differently. In Hell all go hungry because everyone tries to feed themselves only, they are purely self-focused and fail to recognise the hunger in their neighbour sat opposite them. And yet in heaven they attempt to feed one another and are therefore fed in abundance. To me this is as much about the relationships as the food going into one another’s mouths. I believe that we all possess an innate need to serve one another that if we do not do this part of our natural humanity withers away and dies off. By not serving one another we starve our souls. Seems pretty clear, there is nothing ambiguous here. This is real care.

Henri Nouwen said “real care is NOT ambiguous”, he highlighted that the word “care” has its origin from the old English word “caru” meaning “sorrow, anxiety, grief” as well as "burdens of mind; serious mental attention," from the Proto-Germanic word “karo” meaning "lament; grief, care". To really care is to truly feel another’s sorrow to cry out with them and to truly be with them. To care is to truly empathies and not merely sympathies. To truly care is to be with another, it is about meeting another in common human relationship. This is why indifference, to not care, it is hell. This is because it is about breaking that sense of relationship, it is emptiness it is loneliness. It hurts to care, which is why so often we turn away. No one likes to feel powerless and to care is about recognizing our singular powerlessness at times. It’s also about recognising the healing power that can begin to grow from this powerless state, as the common grief is recognised and shared and the healing comes in that very space. This is the power of love. This is the miracle of healing that is recounted again and again in the Gospel accounts; it is the same love that comes alive once again when we recognise one another and truly care. We make heaven. We create the kin-dom, the one-ness of love, right here, right now. For heaven is a place where everything connects.

You see this clearly in the example of Jesus in the Gospel accounts. As Nouwen points out. As Jesus came out of his solitude, he reached out his caring hand to those in need. From his lonely place his care grew strong and from here he entered a healing closeness with his fellow humans. The key is the relationship. It wasn’t merely that he fed folk, or healed them. He did not do so alone, the power is in the relationship. Yes, he fed the people with the loaves and fishes, but only after first been given them by a stranger in the crowd. The Disciples then fed the people face to face. This is care, this is a deep loving relationship. Before returning the boy of Nain to his widowed mother, he first felt her sorrow. Lazarus was raised from the dead through the experience of distress, sorrow and tears. There is a deep connective relationship here, that brings life from death. It is not so much that folk are cured, by some kind of magic. This is not the key to these stories; no, the key is in the relationship. This is real care. It is solidarity in the suffering, participation in the pain. It is the shared experience of suffering; it is deep human connection. This is what it means to truly care. There is nothing ambiguous here. To really care is to truly feel another’s sorrow, to cry out with them and to truly be with them. To care is to truly empathies and not merely sympathies; to truly care is to be with another; to truly care is about meeting another in common human relationship; to truly care is to inhabit Heaven on earth. Where as to be indifferent is to live in a state of Hell. Heaven is connection and Hell is disconnection. It is heaven that is the warm place and hell that is frozen over.

Many people say they feel lonely, that they experience a sense of disconnection. This can become even stronger at this time of the year, early January. The weeks in the deepest part of winter following the Christmas festivities. These are cold, frozen days. Sometimes these frozen feelings are not caused by the temperature of the air, but by indifference and a sense of disconnection. We yearn to be warmed, we yearn to be fed.

Here is a wonderful  poem by David Whyte inspired by "Loaves and Fishes"

“Loaves and Fishes” by David Whyte

This is not
the age of information.

This is NOT
the age of information.

Forget the news,
and the radio,
and the blurred screen.

This is the time of loaves
and fishes.

People are hungry,
and one good word is bread
for a thousand.

“The loaves and fishes are not dead” it comes alive when we care, when we connect, when we empathise and sit with one another. It warms our hearts and souls.

Real care is not ambiguous. Hell is the frozen place; it is Heaven that is warm. We will begin to warm our own hearts and those we share this world with, in and through true care. It begins by recognising what we have in common. It comes in recognising our shared sense of powerlessness at times, for here is where the power comes alive, in this deep relationship of care.

It begins by reconnecting in and through care. Let’s not become frozen people, indifferent people, let us live in and through care. For in so doing we will bring warmth to our lives and those we share our lives we.

Let’s care a lot…

Here is a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"