God chooses the poorest instruments to carry out His work.

As a proof: here I am, a

self-confessed Facebook addict, someone who spends more time online than with my real
friends, and now, I am about to give a talk on Friendship real friendship that is
characterized by personal dealings, trust, and naturalness. Now, you can easily guess what
God wants me to give up for Lent. So lets get on with the topic of FRIENDSHIP
First and foremost, we have to be friends of God.
Have a personal relationship with God, exemplified by this famous story of St. Teresa of
Avila:
As she founded and visited convents, Teresa often traveled the rugged roads of Spain. One
time, as she crossed a stream, her saddle slipped and was
knocked off from her donkey.
S
he found herself head down in the mud under the belly of a donkey and with an injured
leg. Complaining to the Lord of her treatment
, she said,
Lord, you couldnt have picked a
worse time for this to happen. Why would you let this happen?
And the response in prayer that she heard was, That is how I treat my friends.
Teresa answered, And that is why you have so few of them!
But since
Christ has so few friends, she felt they should be
good ones. And that's why she
decided to reform her Carmelite order.
And if we are indeed friends of God like St. Teresa, we are called to bring Christ to all the
corners of the world. You are the salt
. These words of Christ appear within the Sermon
on the Mount, immediately following the Beatitudes. Poverty, meekness, hunger and thirst
for justice, mercy, cleanness of heart, peace, patience in persecutions, and
joycharacteristics of those our Lord calls blessedare, as it were, the unfolding of charity,
and truly identify Christs disciples.
Friendship (Apostolate) is an overflow of sanctity. Sanctity is attractive.
The presence of persons who are cheerful and optimistic, and capable of giving a reason for
their joy, allows many others to live with the active hope of reaching a happiness true to
the aspirations of the human heart, without falling into the temptation of being content
with less.
How important it is that there be men and women who in their ordinary lives, with Christs
peace and joy, foster the hope of attaining a life that is happy here on earth, amid both
suffering and joy, with a happiness that will be complete in heaven!
Ordinary life offers an infinity of situations that put our Christian identity to the test, our
being signs of hope. When we are determined to be faithful to the truth without fearing the
consequences, and we resist the pressure to act superficially; when we make the firm
resolution to place peace in the family before self love, forgetting past offenses and with a
heart open to understanding and forgiveness; when we personally renounce comforts in
order to win a greater freedom of heart; when we struggle bravely to live a clean life, and
we know how to rectify and begin againthen we are salt.
TRUST.
That constant struggle to be true friends of God leads us to become faithful, integral
Christians. Probably just by going to regular Confession will give rise to questions in
well-intentioned people, since the new life it gives testimony to requires an explanation.

The witness of so many Christian families living their faith amid the sorrows and joys of this
life leads many persons to ask what is the source of this peace and joy, what is the reason
for such self-denial, why such desires to serve even without tangible rewards.
These are some of the questions that can run through the minds of our colleagues and
acquaintances, although at first perhaps they dont vocalize them. Our friendship will be
what wins their trust; it will be the channel through which many people, challenged by the
testimony of good example, will be receptive to good doctrine. Sowing friendship is
essential to our way of being in the middle of the world.
CHARITY
The virtue of charity enables us to grasp the deepest reality about our neighbour. With the
help of Gods grace, we Christians discover in each person a child of God, a brother or
sister of Christ; we discover God himself there, who gives us his image in the human person,
so that we may treat it with respect and honour it as we should. Apostolate, which aims to
be one and the same thing as friendship, is simply veneratingI insistthe image of God
that is found in each and every human being, and doing all we can to get them in turn to
contemplate that image, so that they may learn to turn to Christ.
[

Friends of God
, 230
]
The true proof of friendship is putting others first, giving them our time and attention.
Charity acquires its true meaning when another persons life becomes a priority for me.
People who meet an authentic Christian need to discover Gods own love, when they see
how they are treated, how they are valued, how they are listened to, how their virtues are
taken into account, how they are given the chance to become part of this supernatural
adventure.
Charity is always ready to seek what is best for everyone, which requires a great and
generous heart, learning to pass over others defects as well as our own, rising above
irritation, bad moods or rude answers. Charitable people are patient, with fortitude of
spirit: they know how to wait, to never humiliate others, to bear anything for love; they
dont complain, or take pleasure in others sorrows or setbacks, and dont seek to stand
out. They are always ready to provide a friendly word of understanding and peace.
Friendship is something that is easily noticed; it is almost a tangible reality: we can sense
that we are in tune with a friend, that there is an affinity between us, that we enjoy one
anothers company. For Christians, friendship is raised up to a new level by grace, and
becomes a way to communicate Christs life to others. Thus friendship is transformed into a
real gift from God, inseparable from charity.
UNDERSTANDING
We all need to grow in our appreciation for the value of friendship, and expand the circle of
our acquaintances. As Christians we need to establish a positive dialogue with a great
variety of people, and never allow our own opinions to result in unjust discrimination, or
our attitudes or words to offend those who have a different viewpoint. To achieve this, we
need to be willing to listen to others and try to understand their reasons for saying what
they do; otherwise there would be no true dialogue, because people would soon realize we
werent really interested in what they say. We need to learn to see things from other
peoples point of view.

This doesnt mean that we should yield in matters that dont depend on ussince they
belong to Godor hide or distort Christs teachings out of fear of hurting someone. Such an
attitude would be equivalent to deceiving someone we love, closing off to them the path to
the only truth that can fully satisfy the yearning of the human heart and cure its
restlessness. Rather, Christs charity strengthens our own viewpoint, while giving peace to
our heart and gentleness to our way of expressing ourselves. Thus we will make our Lords
message of hope and salvation more attractive to others: when we give advice, when we
correct someones attitude, our affection for our friends will lead us to use words that
dont cause them pain or imply that we are judging them. Our words will be perceived for
what they really are: a sincere desire for our friends happiness.
Then we experience the deep truth of the words of St. Ignatius of Antioch: Christianity is
not a work of persuasion, but of greatness. The greatness that is Christs charity, since
people will be drawn to God not so much by our arguments as by what they see in us, with
Gods grace.
Every generation of Christians needs to redeem, to sanctify its own time. In order to do
this, it must understand and share the desires of other menones equalsin order to make
known to them, with a gift of tongues, how they are to correspond to the action of the Holy
Spirit, to that permanent outflow of rich treasures that comes from our Lords heart. We
Christians are called upon to announce, in our own time, to this world to which we belong
and in which we live, the messageold and at the same time newof the Gospel. (
Christ is
Passing By
, 132)
DEMANDING:
Jesus awakened dormant consciences with great delicacy, helping them to judge their own
actions objectively. We see this with the Samaritan woman. First he gained her confidence
by letting her see that, even though he was a Jew, he did not refuse to speak with
Samaritans. He spoke to her about what interested her, since drawing water was part of her
daily concerns. He brought light to her conscience little by little, with the skill of one who
knows how to read souls. He asked her to call her husband, thereby causing her to reveal
almost inadvertently something about her personal life:
I have no husband
. Finally our
Lords words bring her face to face with the light of the truth, showing her that she needs
to convert:
You are right in saying, I have no husband; for you have had five husbands,
and he whom you now have is not your husband
.[8]
Overcome our fear: Example of Ananais (cowardly and reluctant disciple from Damascus),
Fraternal correction
The gift of tongues requires imagination, and imagination requires love and a deep and
well-assimilated knowledge of the truth and of current circumstances. The apostolate of
good doctrine is far different from a checklist of memorized answers.
On the contrary, when we get to know each soul deeply through prayer and friendship,
when we thoroughly assimilate good doctrine through piety and study, we will be able to
give the true reasons for our hope and illumine the minds and hearts of many people with
the light of Christ.

HUMBLE: True humility permits friendship to grow strong and sound. For only the humble
can grasp the full meaning of Christs words I came not to be served, but to serve.
Consequently, only the true friend is aware of the joyful obligation friendship lays upon
him. He is ever watchful of the needs of those around him, ever mindful that the noblest
thing a man can do is to love another person as oneself with a love that is both demanding
and understanding. Simply because it is the same love that our Heavenly Father has for his
children. Hence, it is only fitting that as children of the same Father, we too love one
another as He has loved us.