How compassionate are we? The word "compassion" means to "suffer with" someone, in the sense of coming to the person's aid. Jesus showed compassion frequently in his ministry. Take the example of Jesus raising the only son of a widow to life from the dead. 

Here are the words of Pope Francis, reflecting on this passage in Luke's Gospel (Luke 7:11-17). It is compassion "that makes Jesus see the ultimate reality of that moment. There was a great crowd following Jesus; there were the disciples; there was the funeral procession; there were the mother and the dead man....Jesus saw the reality and the reality was that woman, stripped of everything because she had lost her only son and she had been left a widow.

"Compassion reveals reality as it is. Compassion is like the lens of the heart: it makes us truly understand the magnitude of a situation....Our God is a God of compassion and we can say that compassion is God's weakness but also his strength. It was indeed his compassion that led him to send his Son to us. Compassion is not a simple feeling of pity. It is involving oneself in the problems of others out of love."

How compassionate are we? Is love the reason for our compassion?