We have all experienced how inadequate it can be when someone understands the facts of our situation but fails to grasp what those facts mean to us. A musician who plays for friends does not simply want them to recognize that the piece was technically well performed; he hopes they will share something of the enjoyment he found in playing it. If they respond with detached correctness and no enthusiasm, he may feel disappointed even though their judgment was favorable. Human relationships depend on more than exchanging accurate information. We need to feel that others have understood something of what we are experiencing.

Many difficulties in family life, friendship and work could be avoided if we made a greater effort to understand the feelings, expectations and concerns of others. St. Josemaría wrote that “charity consists not so much in giving as in understanding.” To understand another person in this deeper sense means trying to see circumstances from his point of view rather than interpreting everything through our own temperament and experience. This capacity is commonly called empathy. When joined to Christian charity, it helps create a genuine communion of hearts.

Empathy is not simply an emotional reaction. We may naturally feel another person’s sadness or share his enthusiasm, but Christian empathy asks for something more deliberate. We try to enter another person’s world with respect, to understand what he is experiencing and why he may react differently from us. This requires attention and imagination because people differ greatly in temperament, personal history, sensitivities and ways of expressing themselves. What seems insignificant to us may weigh heavily on someone else.

Jesus gives us the perfect example. The Gospels repeatedly show his extraordinary sensitivity to the people around him. When he approaches the town of Nain and sees a funeral procession, no one needs to explain the tragedy to him. He recognizes immediately the suffering of a widow who has lost her only son and is moved with compassion. When Jairus begs him to save his daughter, Jesus understands the anguish of a father. When crowds have remained with him for days, he notices their hunger and refuses simply to send them away. At the tomb of Lazarus, he knows that he will soon raise his friend from the dead, yet he still weeps with Martha and Mary because their sorrow is real.

Christ never treats people as cases to be solved. He sees the person before him. He understands the suffering of the sick, the shame of the sinner, the confusion of his disciples and the loneliness of those whom society has pushed aside. His compassion is never sentimental because it always leads to action. He heals, consoles, forgives, teaches or corrects according to what each person truly needs.

We learn from him that empathy begins with attention. We cannot understand another person if we are absorbed in ourselves. Sometimes we listen while preparing our reply, judging what is being said or waiting for an opportunity to return the conversation to our own concerns. Genuine listening requires us to set aside our immediate agenda long enough to receive what the other person is trying to communicate.

This can be difficult because words do not always reveal everything. A person may say that he is fine while his tone or manner suggests otherwise. Someone who reacts sharply may be carrying a burden we know nothing about. Another person may struggle to express what is troubling him. Empathy does not mean imagining hidden motives or making psychological diagnoses. It means remaining attentive enough to recognize that there may be more to a person’s behaviour than what appears on the surface.

Christ’s example also shows that understanding does not mean approving everything another person thinks or does. Jesus is infinitely compassionate, but he never confuses compassion with indifference to truth. He forgives sinners while calling them to conversion. He listens patiently to his disciples but corrects their mistaken ambitions and their lack of faith. When James and John want to call down fire upon a Samaritan village, he rebukes them. His love is both understanding and demanding because he seeks the true good of each person.

This balance is essential. Empathy is sometimes understood today as though entering into another person’s feelings required us to affirm every conclusion he draws from them. But we can understand why someone feels angry without approving an unjust action prompted by anger. We can sympathize with someone’s confusion without pretending that error is truth. Christian charity asks us to accompany people as they are while helping them move toward what is good.

The Apostles themselves had to learn this way of dealing with others. John, whose forceful temperament helped earn him and his brother James the nickname “Sons of Thunder,” gradually became the Apostle who wrote most insistently about love. His closeness to Christ did not erase his personality but purified and transformed it. The same strong character that once wanted punishment for an inhospitable village became capable of expressing the tenderness of the words, “Beloved, let us love one another.”

Peter underwent a similar transformation. He could be impulsive and harsh, yet after Pentecost we find him addressing people who had participated in rejecting Christ without rancor. He tells them that they acted in ignorance and invites them to repent so that they may receive forgiveness. Truth has not been weakened, but it is communicated in a way that leaves the door open to conversion.

St. Paul gives another striking example in Athens. He is deeply troubled by the city’s idolatry, but when he speaks at the Areopagus he does not begin by insulting his listeners or condemning everything they believe. He notices an altar inscribed “To an unknown god” and begins there. He recognizes in their religious searching something that can become a point of contact: “What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.” Paul understands that people are more likely to receive the truth when we first make the effort to understand where they are.

This principle remains important in apostolate and in ordinary human relationships. We may be convinced that another person is mistaken, but simply stating the truth more forcefully does not guarantee that he will be able to hear it. People have histories. They may have received poor formation, been hurt by Christians, absorbed mistaken ideas from the surrounding culture or never encountered someone who presented the faith attractively and coherently. Understanding these circumstances does not change the truth, but it changes the way we communicate it.

Charity therefore teaches us patience. St. Josemaría insisted that error is overcome not by force but by prayer, grace, study and charity. The Christian approach is to speak the truth in love. Sometimes this requires a clear correction; at other times it requires waiting, listening or allowing a relationship of trust to grow before difficult matters can be addressed fruitfully.

Pope Francis has often emphasized the importance of accompaniment: slowing down enough to see and listen to others rather than rushing past them. The father in the parable of the prodigal son offers a powerful image. He does not approve of his son’s departure or pretend that the young man’s choices were harmless. Yet the door remains open. When the son finally returns, he finds a father ready to receive him.

Empathy should never become a technique for manipulating people. In commercial life, someone may study another person’s desires in order to sell him something. Christian apostolate operates according to a different logic. We do not take an interest in people merely because we hope eventually to persuade them. We care about them because they are persons loved by God.

This sincerity is crucial. People usually sense when interest is merely strategic. If friendship disappears as soon as someone shows no interest in our beliefs, it was not much of a friendship. Apostolate grows naturally from genuine affection. We want the people around us to know Christ because we love them and desire their good, not because we regard them as projects.

St. Paul expresses this identification with others when he writes, “Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?” His apostolic heart does not remain outside the struggles of the people he serves. Their difficulties affect him. Their joys become his joys and their suffering becomes, in some measure, his own.

Listening is one of the most concrete ways we learn this empathy. To listen well is more than remaining silent until another person stops speaking. We try to understand what he means, including what may be difficult for him to express. We resist the temptation to interrupt too quickly with advice or with a story about ourselves. Sometimes the greatest help we can give initially is to allow another person to put his experience into words.

This is particularly important when someone is suffering. Our instinct may be to offer explanations immediately because we want to make the pain disappear. But a person who has suffered a loss may not first need an explanation. He may need someone who is willing to remain with him in his grief. Jesus knew that Lazarus would rise, yet before performing the miracle he wept with those who mourned. His tears teach us that knowing the ultimate answer does not excuse us from sharing another person’s present sorrow.

Empathy also helps us correct others more effectively. A correction given without understanding can humiliate or provoke defensiveness even when its content is true. Before speaking, we should try to understand the person’s circumstances, intentions and capacity to receive what we want to say. The same words can have very different effects depending on timing and tone.

The disciples on the road to Emmaus provide a beautiful example of Christ’s way of accompanying people. They are leaving Jerusalem discouraged and confused after the Crucifixion. Jesus joins them, but he does not immediately reveal himself or begin with a lecture. He asks what they have been discussing and allows them to explain their disappointment. They tell him their hopes and describe the events as they understand them.

Only after listening does Jesus begin to correct their interpretation. He explains the Scriptures and shows them that the Messiah’s suffering was not the defeat they imagined but part of God’s saving plan. His correction is real—he even reproaches their slowness to believe—but it occurs within a conversation in which they have first been allowed to speak. By the time they reach Emmaus, they want him to remain with them: “Stay with us.”

There is an important lesson here for parents, teachers, spiritual directors and anyone who tries to help another person grow. We may see the solution before the other person does, but simply announcing it is not always enough. People often need to feel understood before they are ready to receive guidance. When they know that we have listened seriously and respected their experience, correction is more likely to be recognized as an expression of love rather than control.

Empathy is especially necessary when dealing with people whose temperament differs from ours. An energetic person may become impatient with someone who needs more time to make decisions. A highly rational person may underestimate the emotional weight of a situation for someone more sensitive. A person who recovers quickly from setbacks may find it difficult to understand why another remains affected for much longer.

Maturity requires us to resist the assumption that our own way of reacting is the normal measure for everyone else. People differ greatly from one another. Men and women can also experience and communicate certain situations differently, and even within each sex there is enormous individual variation. Good relationships require us to learn the particular person before us rather than rely on simplistic categories.

Our personal histories matter as well. People may carry wounds, fears or insecurities that are not immediately visible. A reaction that seems disproportionate may make more sense when we understand what someone has lived through. We should not use this fact to excuse harmful behaviour, but it can help us respond with greater patience and wisdom.

Empathy also requires humility because we can never enter another person’s interior world completely. We should be cautious about saying, “I know exactly how you feel.” Even if we have experienced something similar, the other person is not us. A better attitude is one of respectful curiosity: we listen, ask appropriate questions and allow the person to tell us what the experience means to him.

There are times when empathy will require sacrifice. Listening takes time. Accompanying someone through a long difficulty can become tiring. The same problem may be discussed repeatedly, and progress may be slow. Charity is tested precisely when understanding another person is no longer emotionally rewarding.

We also need boundaries. Empathy does not require us to absorb every emotion around us or assume responsibility for solving everyone’s problems. We can accompany someone without becoming emotionally dependent upon his state of mind. Sometimes genuine love requires encouraging a person to take responsibility, seek professional help or make a difficult change rather than continually rescuing him from consequences.

Jesus combines compassion and freedom perfectly. He is deeply moved by human suffering, but he is never controlled by the emotions or expectations of the crowd. He sometimes withdraws to pray, refuses demands that do not correspond to his mission and allows people to walk away when they reject his teaching. His empathy is governed by love and truth, not by a need to be approved.

For us, this balance requires prayer. Natural sensitivity varies from person to person. Some people easily perceive the feelings of others; others are more reserved or task-oriented and may overlook emotional signals. But empathy can grow. By asking Christ to give us his heart, we can learn to notice more, listen better and respond with greater understanding.

Our examination of conscience can help. We might ask whether we truly listened to the people we encountered during the day, whether we dismissed someone’s concern too quickly or whether our words were harsher than necessary. We can consider whether we tend to interrupt, assume motives or offer advice before understanding the problem. Small improvements in these areas can profoundly change our relationships.

A healthy sense of humour can also help us live empathy. If we take ourselves too seriously, we become preoccupied with how others treat us and less attentive to what they may be experiencing. Learning to laugh at our own mistakes makes us more approachable and less defensive. It becomes easier for others to speak openly when they do not fear that every misunderstanding will wound our pride.

Empathy ultimately belongs within charity. By itself, the ability to understand another person’s feelings can be morally neutral; it could even be used to manipulate. Charity gives it direction. We seek to understand because we want the true good of the other person.

This means that empathy sometimes consoles and sometimes challenges. We may need to sit beside someone who is grieving without saying much. On another occasion, love may require us to tell a friend something he does not want to hear. The important thing is that both consolation and correction arise from the same desire: to serve the person before us.

When people sense this, communication changes. They know that we are not simply waiting to impose our view. They experience our advice within a relationship of trust. Even difficult truths can then find an opening because affection has prepared the way.

The example of Christ remains our guide. He noticed the widow of Nain before she asked for anything. He wept with Martha and Mary. He listened to the confused disciples on the road to Emmaus before correcting them. He saw beyond appearances to the interior needs of each person, and his understanding always served their true good.

As we grow closer to him, our own way of dealing with people should acquire something of this sensitivity. We learn to look beyond ourselves, to notice what others may be carrying and to listen before judging. We become more patient with differences and more thoughtful in the way we speak.

Such empathy does not weaken truth. It makes truth more humanly accessible because it is communicated through love. Nor does it mean that we must share every feeling or agree with every opinion. It means that we refuse to reduce people to their mistakes, arguments or outward behaviour. We try to meet them as Christ meets us: with a clear understanding of the truth, but also with patience, respect and a sincere desire for their good.

In the end, empathy is one of the ways charity becomes concrete. We cannot love people in the abstract. We love particular persons with particular histories, needs and struggles. The more we learn to enter respectfully into their experience, the better we can accompany them in joy and sorrow and help them move toward the fullness of life God desires for them.

Christ does not merely teach us to understand others; he gives us the grace to share his own way of seeing them. If we remain close to him, our hearts can gradually become more like his. We will learn to notice, to listen and to respond with the combination of tenderness and truth that allows another person to feel genuinely understood while also being encouraged to grow.

By the Via Virtutis team

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash