Overcoming Human Respect

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

When Jesus began His public life many of His neighbors and relatives took Him for a madman (Mark 3:21). On His first visit to Nazareth, His relatives deny seeing in Him anything supernatural or extraordinary.

In their comments, you can see that their envy is only barely concealed. “‘Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works? Is this not the son of the carpenter?’ … And they took offense at him” (Matt. 13:54-55,57).

Right from the start, Our Lord faced a steady stream of insults and abuse, born of cowardly egoism, because people claimed the Word without human respect.

This ill-treatment increased steadily with time, until it broke out into calumny and open persecution, culminating in the death sentence. Christ’s fortitude was recognized even by His enemies, who said, “Teacher, we know that you are true, and teach the way of God truthfully, and care for no man; for you do not regard the position of men” (Matt. 22:16).

Christ asks His disciples to imitate Him in this practice. Christians should foster and defend their well-earned professional, moral, and social prestige, because it belongs to the essence of human dignity. This prestige is also an important component of our personal apostolate.

We shouldn’t forget that our conduct will meet with opposition from those who openly oppose Christian morality and those who practice a watered-down version of the faith.

There was a man who was a pharmacist many years ago in Dublin. He attended a session that was called, sort of a conference, whose purpose was to try and encourage the pharmacists in the country to stock the contraceptive pill. He was a bit suspicious of this whole thing.

He went along and one of the speakers was a prominent moral theologian from the major seminary, who was a dissenter on Humanae Vitae. This man gave his speech, and this pharmacist, when he heard this priest saying these things, didn’t quite agree with all the things the priest was saying. He felt he had to do something.

He had never spoken in public before, but he invoked the Holy Spirit, and he went to the microphone and said, “Father, I’d just like to say that I think the teaching of the Church is not exactly what you have said. It’s more like this, this, and this.” He explained things very clearly, very briefly, very politely, and then he sat down.

People came to him afterwards and said, “That was fantastic. You should speak more often.” The following year, they made him the chairman of the Association of Pharmacists in the whole country, and they managed to keep the contraceptive pill out of the country for the next thirty years.

Sometimes we have to have the courage to speak. It’s possible that Our Lord will even ask us to sacrifice our good name, and maybe even life itself. With the help of His grace we will struggle to do His Will with the great awareness that everything that we have belongs to God.

Every Christian has to try and put aside any fears of ‘rocking the boat’ if his upright conduct should provoke criticism or rejection. Whoever out of human respect would hide his Christian identity in the midst of a pagan environment would merit the denunciation that Our Lord speaks of in the Gospel: “Whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father in heaven” (Matt. 10:33).

A colleague of mine told me how he was taking coffee after lunch one day in the medical residence. There were about ten or twenty other young doctors there, and a senior registrar came in and happened to start talking about all the sterilization operations that he had performed.

This colleague of mine felt very uncomfortable. He had a lot of formation, was trying to lead a good Christian life, and he felt he should say something.

When the person was finished speaking, he sort of piped up and said, “Well, I’d just like to say I don’t agree with what you’re saying”—which often is the least thing we must do: to disagree, to make a stand, to raise our voice.

To his surprise, as soon as he said it, a guy on his left leaned over and said, “I couldn’t agree with you more,” whispering. And a lady on the other side leaned over and whispered, “Terrible idiot.” He realized that half the room was with him.

Sometimes all that is needed is one voice. But it may be that Our Lord wants our voice to be that voice.

At times, in our family or among friends, it may be necessary to exercise supernatural fortitude in order to be consistent with our beliefs. But a Christian may well have to put up with, very often, rumors, calumnies, mockery, discrimination at work, the loss of economic opportunities, or superficial relationships and friendships. Our Lord went through all of these things.

Our Lord teaches us that confessing our faith is a requirement for being His disciple, no matter what the consequences may be. That’s the way many of Christ’s first disciples conducted themselves. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were hidden disciples of the Lord, but they stepped forward as Christians at the hour when all seemed lost.

Unlike many others, we’re told in The Way, “they are courageous in the face of authority, declaring their love for Christ boldly in the hour of cowardice” (Josemaría Escrivá, The Way, Point 841). That’s how the apostles behaved before the Sanhedrin and before the pagan persecutions.

St. Paul says to the Corinthians, “For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). And St. Paul writes to Timothy, “For God did not give us a spirit of timidity but a spirit of power and love and self-control. Do not be ashamed then of testifying to Our Lord”

These are words which are directed at us today, as we seek to be faithful to the Master even though the environment might seem to be against us.

Overcoming human respect is part of the virtue of fortitude. The life of a Christian should develop in a fairly ordinary manner in normal circumstances. But frequently this way of life will stand in stark contrast to other ‘lifestyles’ more or less Christian, as well as to a kind of behavior which is beneath human dignity and which is therefore anti-Christian.

In these latter cases it is not surprising that the contrast would be striking. We shouldn’t be surprised that non-believers or the indifferent may unjustly criticize a follower of Christ, perhaps even to the extent of resorting to ridicule. The same thing happened to Our Lord.

In the course of day-to-day living, we’re probably not talking about suffering physical harm for the sake of the Gospel.

But a Christian may have to put up with rumors, or calumnies, or mockery, or discrimination at work, or the loss of economic opportunities. Sometimes, in our family or among friends in a social gathering, it might be necessary to speak out, to disagree, in order to be consistent with our beliefs.

In these uncomfortable circumstances it can be tempting to take the easy way out and to ‘give in.’ By such means we could avoid rejection, misunderstanding, and ridicule. We could become concerned at the thought of losing friends, of ‘closing doors’ which we’ll later be unable to reopen.

This is the temptation to be influenced by human respect, hiding one’s true identity and forsaking our commitment to live as disciples of Christ.

There was a story of a student, a university student in Brazil, who one day in a class heard a teacher say something that he felt was a bit off, not in keeping with the teaching of the Church or with Christian ideals. He put up his hand to disagree or to make a different point.

But the teacher, in a rather annoyed tone, said, “You come and see me after class.” The student got very worried and said, “Oh my goodness, I’m in big trouble.”

He had all sorts of doomsday scenarios going through his mind: “Maybe he’ll kick me out of the class.” “Maybe I won’t be able to finish this course.” “Maybe I won’t be able to graduate.” All sorts of scenarios were popping up in his mind.

Then he remembered a phrase of the Gospel, where Our Lord says, “Do not worry when you are brought before governors and kings on my account. Do not worry what you are going to say, because I will place on your lips what needs to be said in those moments” (cf. Matt. 10:18-19).

Silently he began to complain to God and to say, “You said that you would put on our lips what needs to be said in certain moments, and now look at the mess I’m in. I should have kept my big mouth shut.”

After class he went along to the teacher’s room, knocked on the door, the teacher said, “Come in.” Then the teacher said, “Where did you learn those things that you were saying there in the class?”

Very apologetically he tried to say, “Well, you see, I go to this center of Opus Dei downtown in the last couple of months and years, and maybe, I picked up some of the ideas there.”

The teacher said, “Well, keep going to that place.” The guy was a bit surprised. Keep going to that place? He said to him, “But you seem to be saying the opposite there in the class.”

The teacher said, “Well, yes, because,” he said, “when I was your age, I used to go to that place. They were trying to get me to change my life. But I didn’t have the generosity or the courage to do so. Ever since then I’ve spent half my life saying stupid things and the other half trying to justify what I’ve been saying.”

The student came out of the teacher’s room lifting up his eyes to heaven and saying, “Thank you, Holy Spirit. Thank you, Holy Spirit.”

There’s a temptation to be influenced by human respect, hiding our true identity, forsaking our commitment to live as disciples of Christ. In such difficult circumstances, the Christian ought not to wonder which path is the most opportune to follow, but rather, which path is the most faithful to Christ.

Our desire for popularity is the direct consequence of self-love. It may be that the Lord is waiting for us in just this kind of sacrifice, and this is the time we must choose between His way and our own. That choice may ultimately be expressed by our silence, by a few words, by a gesture, an attitude. Our behavior will be the proving ground of our deepest convictions.

All of us in professional life face situations where we have to take a stand for what is right, for morality, for our Christian faith. In that way, we will be giving the best and greatest service.

Sometimes it may mean that we have to say difficult things to people we love. But as somebody said once, the greatest charity is to confront people with the truth. “The truth will set you free” (John 8:32). The truth is liberating.

This firmness in our faith is often an excellent testimony to the beliefs of the Christian. In some cases it can cause people to begin their return to the House of the Father.

For many who begin to follow Christ, the necessity for this sacrifice is one of the major obstacles in their path. The Curé d’Ars used to say, “Do you know what the devil’s first temptation is to the person who wants to serve God with dedication? It is human respect” (John Vianney, Sermon on Temptations).

We all have an inner aversion from being put to shame before others. But this sacrifice, if we make it, will be the cause of our greatest joy—to take a stand for Jesus Christ, whenever and wherever the circumstances require it. We can be assured that we will never regret being true to our Christian beliefs.

We can also be sure that there are many people around us that are in need of our good example in this area. There are many people around us who are waiting for a clear testimony to the Christian faith.

We can accomplish an awful lot with our good example. The world is very much in need of Christian workers who are friendly, cordial, firm in the faith.

Occasionally we hear of a ‘daring’ article in which somebody attacks the teaching of the Pope or defends abortion or artificial contraception. But the real danger in our age is to defend the teaching authority of the Roman Pontiff in what pertains to faith and morals, to defend the right to life of every person, to have a large family if that is God’s will, to defend the indissolubility of marriage. Many wavering hearts have been fortified by one person’s loyalty to principle.

In order to have the courage necessary to overcome our fears, we need to rely on God’s help. We can’t allow that God would be removed from society, or ‘put into a parenthesis,’ that misguided men relegate the universal moral law to the closet of individual ‘conscience.’

It should not surprise us that we may be tempted to pass unnoticed in certain disagreeable situations. St. Peter himself, after having been confirmed as the Head of the Church, after having received the Holy Spirit, gave in to the human respect of his Jewish brethren. It took no less a man than St. Paul to correct him in that matter (cf. Gal. 2:11-14).

That famous confrontation, far from disproving the holiness and unity of the Church, in fact demonstrates the perfect unity of the apostles, the respect that St. Paul had for the visible Head of the Church, and the great humility of St. Peter in changing his position.

We can help one another in similar circumstances by practicing fraternal correction with our fellow Christians, as was done in the earliest days of the Church.

Our Lord gives us good example on how we should conduct ourselves. From that sad day in Nazareth He knew that many people were not in agreement with Him. Yet He never based His actions upon the opinions of men. Only one thing matters to Our Lord—the Will of His Father.

He never gave up curing people on the Sabbath even though spies were watching Him (cf. Mark 3:2). Jesus knew what He wanted to do, and He knew that from the start. We never see Him have second thoughts or hesitate, much less reverse a decision.

Christ asks us to follow Him with the same fortitude. One writer says, “It is his own method, quite personal to himself that he here enjoins on his disciples. Unconsidered, over-hasty action, vacillation, any coming to terms or compromising, these are not for him. His whole life and being are a Yes and No, nothing else. Jesus is always the complete man, always prepared, for he never speaks or acts except out of his whole clear consciousness and his own firm will” (Karl Adam, The Son of God).

In our prayer today we can ask Our Lord for the strength to guide us at all times to do God’s unchanging Will rather than the fickle will of men.

Just like any true friend Our Lord reveals to His disciples His most intimate thoughts. He tells them of His zeal for the salvation of souls. He says in St. Luke, “I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled!” (Luke 12:49).

He has a holy impatience to ignite and offer His holocaust to the Father on Calvary for the sake of mankind. He says, “I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am constrained until it is accomplished!” (Luke 12:50).

There on the Cross the fullness of God’s love for His creatures was made manifest: “Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). We prove that we are Christ’s friends if we struggle to follow Him.

St. Augustine commented, “People who believe in him are enkindled. They receive the flame of charity. That is why the Holy Spirit appeared in this form at Pentecost: ‘And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each of them’ (Acts 2:3). Set aflame by this fire, the apostles set out across the entire world to inflame others, including their enemies. And what enemies did they have? Those who had forsaken God their Creator for the worship of man-made idols.”

St. Augustine says, “The faith of such as these has been smothered to ashes. It is good for them that they be set alight by this holy flame so that they will once again shine forth in Christ’s glory” (Augustine, Commentary on Psalm 96).

The crucial task of setting the world on fire has been passed [on] to today’s Christians. This fire of love and peace will strengthen and purify souls.

We need to go to the university, to factories, into public life, to our own homes. One writer says, “If one were to set fires at different locations throughout a city, even if they were modest fires they would quickly consume the whole metropolis.

“Likewise, if in a city, at the most distant points, one were to ignite the hearts of the inhabitants with the fire that Jesus brought to the world, then the good will of those people would quickly overrun the city, lighting it up with the love for God.

“The fire Jesus has brought to the world is himself. It is the fire of Love. This is the love which not only unites souls to God but unites souls to one another. … In each city these souls shall emerge from families: father and mother, son and father, mother and mother-in-law. This phenomenon can take place in parish life, in organizations, in schools, in offices, anywhere.

“Each small flame for God necessarily kindles other flames. Divine Providence takes care to distribute these souls on fire where they can best serve the process. Through their action, many places in the world will be restored to the warmth of the love of God and renewed hope” (Chiara Lubich, Meditations).

Our apostolate in the middle of the world should spread like a flame of peace. Our apostolate in the middle of the world should spread like wildfire. Each Christian who lives the faith seriously becomes a point of ignition at his or her place of work, among friends and acquaintances.

But this phenomenon will occur only when we make concrete the advice that Paul gave to the Philippians: “Have this in mind among yourselves, which was in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5).

The apostle “challenges all Christians,” says Pope Pius XII, “to live out in their lives, as much as possible, those sentiments which filled the Divine Redeemer when he offered himself up as a Sacrifice. Imitate his humility and present to God Almighty all the adoration, honor, praise, and thanksgiving” (Pius XII, Encyclical, Mediator Dei, Point 81, November 20, 1947).

This offering is carried out primarily in the Mass, the unbloody renewal of the Sacrifice of the Cross. The Second Vatican Council says, “For all their works, prayers, and apostolic endeavors, their ordinary married and family life, their daily occupations, their physical and mental relaxation, if carried out in the Spirit, and even the hardships of life, if patiently borne—all these [for the laity] become ‘spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ’ (1 Pet. 1:1).

“Together with the offering of the Lord’s body, they are most fittingly offered in the celebration of the Eucharist. Thus, as those everywhere who adore in holy activity, the laity consecrate the world itself to God” (Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, Point 34, November 21, 1964).

Our Christian life ought to be an imitation of the life of Christ, a participation in His divine Sonship. Through this way of life, we will learn from Jesus how to relate to other people. “When Jesus saw the multitude, he had compassion on them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Matt. 9:36). Life held no meaning for them.

Jesus had compassion on these people. His love was so great that He went to the extent of giving up His life for them on the Cross. This is the divine love which we should [have] fill our hearts. Then we too will have compassion on the people around us, who perhaps have strayed from Our Lord. With the help of God’s grace and our genuine friendship, hopefully we will bring these souls back to the Master.

In the Mass a surging current of divine love is transmitted from the Son to the Father through the Holy Spirit. The follower of the Lord participates in this love since he or she is incorporated [in] Christ. The Christian then extends this love to other people and to all earthly realities, which are thereby sanctified and made into a fitting offering to God.

Our apostolate should have its roots in the Mass and should from there draw its effectiveness. For the Mass is nothing less than the realization of the Redemption in our time by means of apostolic Christians.

St. Josemaría says, “Jesus came on earth to receive everyone, because ‘he wished all men to be saved’ (1 Tim. 2:4). There is not a single soul in whom Christ is not interested. Each soul has cost him the price of his blood (cf. 1 Pet. 1:18:19)” (J. Escrivá, Friends of God, Point 256).

If we truly imitate Our Lord’s example we can never be indifferent towards any soul. Let us ask Our Lady that we might put away all types of human respect, that we might have the supernatural fortitude to do the things that God wants us to do, to say the things He wants us to say, to take a stand in certain situations, so that we can be truly leaders whom God has placed in our specific place to carry out our Christian vocation.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

EW