VISUAL MEDITATION - "Checking the Pulse of our Hearts"
- Paul G. Chandler
- Sep 7
- 5 min read
Updated: Sep 8
By Paul G. Chandler - September 8, 2025:
"How much sadness there is in life."
Vincent van Gogh
In U2’s song One Step Closer, Bono sings "A heart that hurts is a heart that beats." This is certainly a “heart-hurting” time in our world. Reading and watching the news is heart-wrenching, often seemingly unbearable.
A friend of mine recently challenged me to focus one of my visual meditations on the suffering of Hagar, a matriarch of my Arab sisters and brothers, whose story is found in the book of Genesis. Hagar, an Egyptian, was the servant of Sarai, the wife of the patriarch Abraham (Ibrahim/Avraham), who twice found herself desolate in the desert. It is a moving story that has captivated the imaginations of artists over the centuries. As I had recently visited a remarkable exhibition of paintings by the famous 19th century French artist Jean-François Millet at the National Gallery of Art in London, his portrayals of Hagar came to mind immediately.
Vincent van Gogh, the artist whose life and art has most influenced my own spiritual journey, was captivated by Millet’s paintings. Van Gogh, a profoundly sensitive artist who knew the depth of suffering himself, was naturally empathetic to the plight of those experiencing great hardship. Hence, he was inspired by Millet’s work, as Millet often painted the disadvantaged in 19th-century France, albeit depicting them respectfully, which was new for the time. Van Gogh made twenty-one paintings that were "translations" of the work of Millet. His brother Theo, an art dealer, viewed the pieces in the series as some of van Gogh’s best work.
Millet painted Hagar and her son Ishmael twice between 1847 and 1849. They are heartrending depictions of Hagar in the wilderness, crying out in utter despair, as her son lies dying.
Millet painted Hagar and Ishmael in the Desert (see painting above) in the years 1847 and 1848 as his first government commission. It was during the same period that Millet was also painting abandoned mothers sheltering children along highways. The second time Millet addressed the subject was a year later, between 1948 and 1849, when he painted Hagar and Ishmael (see painting below). The scene of Hagar and Ishmael is deeply distressing to view. In this second painting, he presents Hagar’s situation as completely bleak, where she has had to physically remove herself from her dying son.
Millet paintings lead the viewer to place themselves in Hagar’s position as she raises her eyes to the sky, seeking divine aid for her dying child. It is impossible to look at these two paintings and not feel a sense of anguish and compassion.
Perhaps more than anything else these days, I have been struck by the seeming lack of compassion. Too often there seems to be a calloused numbness to those in need or who are experiencing profound suffering, whether near or far. When it was announced recently that over 62,000 people have died in the Gaza conflict, and 159,000 have been wounded, someone just casually explained it away to me, saying, “Well, war does lead to causalities. It is never pretty.” There was no sense of sadness or empathy, let alone heartbreak. There was a “heartlessness” in their words.
Why isn’t there an outpouring of compassion at the present time, whether it be for the unhoused, families affected by another gun tragedy, those losing medical coverage, or the thousands upon thousands of people whose very existence is threatened by conflicts initiated or facilitated by those in power with personal agendas and repressive ideologies.
Compassion quite simply means "to suffer with" or "to feel together.” It involves empathy, kindness, tenderness, and a desire to relieve the pain and hardship others are experiencing. No matter what ideological side we find ourselves on, I would go so far as to say that having compassion for all people equally, regardless of their ethnicity, socio-economic status, religion or culture, is the litmus test of the highest form and truest display of what it means to be fully human.
As Vincent van Gogh poignantly wrote, “How much sadness there is in life.” Intense sadness does indeed exist for many. I recall meeting a Syrian artist named Majd Kurdieh, whose mission was to help remove sadness from the world, describing the misery and destruction from war in his own homeland as like a massive sea mammal; “The sadness of the world is as enormous as a whale, and it can’t truly be hidden in a teardrop.”
One of the dangers of continually seeing so much tragedy via social media, is that it blunts the edge of our sensitivity in feeling and caring for those undergoing hardship. An emotional numbness sets in, resulting in a “status quo” disposition, where a detachment develops to the suffering of others.
Like Hagar, people everywhere need our compassion and care. All the time, people are sending out SOS signals - crying "Help!" Some are very visible – like the displaced, injured and hungry in Gaza. Others are almost entirely invisible. Yet compassionate people see through the walls and screens to the pain, and their hearts are touched.
The story of Hagar and Ishmael cast off into the desert is a heartbreaking story through which we are reminded that compassion and empathy are the deepest and most beautiful expressions of what it means to live most fully into our humanity. Thankfully, it is not just a story of despair, but also of hope. For out in the middle of that searing desert, when all Hagar had to live for and to live by was gone, her Creator, the Divine Artist, came to her rescue. Not just once, but twice. From then on, she referred to her Creator as the One “who sees her.” She is also promised that her son will not just survive, but thrive.
Perhaps Millet was seeking to draw attention to this divine hope in his second painting. In the barren landscape above her dying son, is an intimation of greenery off in the distance. If life has survived in this dry wilderness, so will Hagar and Ishmael.
While this poignant story tests the tenderness of our hearts, it also reveals the compassionate nature of our Creator. The Divine Artist saw Hagar in her suffering. I don’t think there is anything more reflective of having been in the image of the Divine Artist than compassion.
The capacity to be moved by another’s suffering is what compels us to reach across racial, cultural and religious barriers. And it requires that something of ourselves goes into it, for compassion is empathy acted out. The tears must be real tears. And anything that separates us from empathizing with other human beings, is the antithesis of the image of the Divine Artist in which we were all created.
Perhaps all of this is what the Egyptian Desert Fathers and Mothers of the 4th century meant when they declared:
“Acquire a heart and you will be saved.”
