Is there a danger in assuming that one will always able to understand a client's unique challenges and lifestyles enough to "walk in the clients' shoes"?

Let me give you an example. My metropolitan area(Mpls./St. Paul) has the largest Somali and East African immigrant population in the country, so many in the human services professions are well versed in the history, political nuances, and culture of this community. That said, it would also be fair to say, that few in the human services profession have lived through decades of civil war,torture and brutality, or displacement to several refugee camps throughout various areas of the world, all of which is part of the living history, and therefore the living culture, of most of the clients with whom one might work from this population. While learning as much as one can about this culture can definitely increase sensitivity on the part of the therapist, can one outside of the clients' experience ever reach the level of empathy required to even come close to holding the clients' shoes, much less "walk" in them? Is there a danger in believing that we can? Is empathy a necessary part of professional competence?