God of Empathy
Empathy Ain't a Sin
In the last few years, a segment of Christianity has been arguing that empathy is a sin. The levels of empathy required for it to be sin vary, but all the arguments list radical empathy as sin. This is a real head-scratcher for me as the God of scripture is a God of radical empathy. From the earliest stories such as Hagar being protected and God accepting her naming of God to the many calls for mercy and care, God is empathetic with creation. This, like God’s very nature as love, is another way in which God’s holiness is on display. For those who have not heard, holiness is being wholly other and God’s empathy is wholly other than ours.
But that brings up the question; “why do so many Christians see empathy as a sin?” I believe things like politics, culture, and fear are factors, but there is one factor that fully allows empathy to be seen as sin. That is the way many do not see God as empathetic. My friend, Bob Hunter mentions the consequences of what he calls a “blurred image of God,” in his book Putting a New Face on God. "Blurry-faced versions of God that are angry, unpredictable, and unsympathetic collect on our spiritual windshield. These blurred versions of God afflict instead of affirm. Life events feel more like punishment instead of privileged opportunities for growth. An obstructed spiritual windshield produces versions of God that hamper our development as humans. (Hunter p 17) Why do we get God so wrong? I believe it is because we miss the point of the Incarnation.
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The segment of Christianity that sees empathy as sin also views the work of Jesus on the cross as a transaction, as punishment, and as evidence of a God whose honor and holiness demand payment or blood*. If you view the work of Jesus as any of those things, then it is difficult to see God as empathetic. If you see the Cross untethered from empathy, then your view of God can become blurred, skewed, and problematic. In fact, the ideas with transaction and punishment are pagan rather than Christian. While it would be easy to reject that as non-Christian, I must admit that there is a stream that leans into pagan understandings of God within orthodoxy. But, it is still rooted in paganism and thus unable to see God as empathetic.
Wesleyan-Holiness theology is rooted in a better understanding of God, but even some of us get it wrong. William Lane Craig, for example, views penal substitution as the best view of atonement. H Ray Dunning has shown how that view is not particularly Wesleyan, even as John Wesley leaned into the understanding (as did the Church of England.) Dunning explains why, “The logical conclusion of the penal theory is either universalism or a limited atonement. If Christ suffers the penalty for sin, the justice of God is satisfied, and therefore nothing further is needed.” (Dunning) I think James Cone explains why the Cross is deeply empathetic, “The cross is a paradoxical religious symbol because it inverts the world’s value system with the news that hope comes by way of defeat, that suffering and death do not have the last word, that the last shall be first and the first last.” (Cone p24)The Cross inverts the value systems of the world. The Cross lays bare the ideas of transactional holiness and punishment as redemptive. Instead, the Cross is the center of the reality of God as empathetically giving Godself over to the violence if humanity in order to show us that violence, sin, and death do not have the final word.
Any God who is devoid of empathy is an idol. I could not imagine an non-empathetic God because of the Cross. Why would people want empathy to be a sin? So they can be comfortable when they support things which harm others. If empathy is sin, then it is easy to justify dehumanizing others. We cannot empathize with their predicament or try to understand if empathy is sin.
The good news is that empathy is anything but sin. Empathy is the outpouring of love and care of a God who is present in and to all. Bob Hunter explains the deep truth of God as empathetic: “Love, which by definition, is empathetic and sympathetic. We can safely assume a God of love is genuinely interested in the well-being of people like you and me because God became a human and experienced the fullness of humanity.” (Hunter, pp51–52)" If God is a God of empathy, then we can be a people of empathy. When someone tells you that empathy is a sin, just say “get behind me, Satan.”
*Richard Beck deals with the scriptural understanding of blood in a recent blog post: https://experimentaltheology.blogspot.com/2025/01/without-shedding-of-blood-there-is-no.html
Dunning, H. Ray. Grace, Faith, and Holiness : A Wesleyan Systematic Theology. Kansas City, Mo.: Beacon Hill Press of Kansas City, 1988.
Hunter, Bob. *Putting a New Face on God: How you see God shapes your life" (pp. 51–52).