I have a friend that I talk with every day. We call it our 15 minutes. We share the day’s highs and lows, spiritual insights, prayer intentions, and what we see God doing in our lives. On the occasion of one of these recent talks, he proclaimed, with the excitement of an astronomer who had discovered a new planet in our solar system, “there is no them.” “What do you mean ‘there is no them,’” I protested. What about all the groups that deny the human dignity of unborn children, undocumented immigrants, or prisoners on death row? What about the Russian leadership who ordered the invasion of the Ukraine? What about the people who vandalize churches, who spread hate through their rhetoric or their actions, who haven’t an ounce of compassion for those that are hurting or in need? What about those people?”
“That’s what I am talking about,” he said. “When we say “those people” or “those groups” or “the Russian leadership,” we lose sight of the fact that we are talking about individual human persons. Behind the lumping labels are real persons, made in the image and likeness of God, male and female, dark skinned and light skinned, brown eyed, green eyed, blue eyed — a unique and unrepeatable expression of the Creator. Furthermore, they are our brothers and sisters, part of the same human family that Jesus died to save. God desires all of his children to be with Him in eternity. There can’t be any “them;” there is only “us.” Our job is to help each person find and connect with the Incarnate Love of God, Jesus. We will meet some persons in our daily lives and are called to show God’s love to them in a personal way. Others we are called to help through our prayers.
I have thought a lot about that conversation over the last few weeks and now I try to stop myself if I start moving toward an “us” versus “them” mentality. That conversation linked with a recent posting by Father John Riccardo on the Acts XXIX website. He writes:
“First, as Christians, as disciples of Jesus, the Eternal Son of God who became flesh to redeem the world from the power of Hell, it is paramount that we remember and understand who the enemy is. The enemy is the Enemy. Period.
It is not another political party. It is not a politician. It is not those who champion a right to abortion. It is not even the doctors who profit from abortion and perform them. The enemy is Hell. Period.
As a disciple of Jesus, I have no human enemies. As a disciple of Jesus, I am not allowed to have any human enemies. I might be theirs. They are not mine. They are just rebels. I have often in my life been a rebel. So have you. And you got won. And you probably got won by kindness, by someone who took the time to listen, by someone who took the time to care, by someone who might have provoked us to ask tough questions. But they did it in such a way that we weren’t condemned. We were not yelled at. It was obvious we actually mattered to them. We need to remember that. We in the Church, Catholic and not, often sound like the world. We can’t do that. It is not allowed. It is forbidden, as a matter of fact. Forbidden by God. We have to be careful.”
So this week let us put aside “us” versus “them” and work to help our brothers and sisters find and connect with the Incarnate Love of God, through our kindness, our caring, our listening, our asking the tough questions, and our prayers!