A large part of the Christian life is lived through our ordinary dealings with other people. We meet them at home, at work, in shops and on the street. Some become close friends, while others pass through our lives only briefly. We naturally find certain people easy to like and others more difficult. Yet all these relationships provide opportunities to live charity, often through small acts that seem unimportant but have a considerable effect on the atmosphere around us.
The life of Christ shows us how much importance we should give to these ordinary human relationships. After Matthew responded to Our Lord’s call, he invited Jesus to a banquet attended by tax collectors and others whom respectable society regarded as sinners. The Pharisees were scandalized and asked why he ate with such people. Jesus replied that those who are well do not need a physician, but those who are sick. He had come for everyone and was entirely at ease among people whose backgrounds, personalities and reputations were very different.
We see this throughout the Gospel. Jesus speaks naturally with children and beggars, fishermen and scholars, the sick and the powerful. He visits the home of Martha, Mary and Lazarus and enjoys their friendship. He speaks privately with Nicodemus, receives those who come seeking healing and allows people whom others despise to approach him. He is never indifferent to the person in front of him.
Christ does not relate to everyone in exactly the same way. He knows when to console and when to correct, when to speak firmly and when to remain silent. His openness to people does not mean that he approves of everything they do. He can denounce hypocrisy strongly while showing extraordinary tenderness toward someone burdened by sin. What remains constant is his respect for the person and his desire for that person’s good.
If we want to follow Christ, something of this openness should gradually appear in us. A Christian cannot be so enclosed in his own concerns that other people become little more than interruptions. We need to learn how to live with people as they actually are, with different temperaments, histories, opinions, sensitivities and defects. This is not always easy, but it is one of the principal places where charity becomes concrete.
The family is our first school in this art. The hidden life of Jesus at Nazareth reminds us that most human formation takes place through years of ordinary coexistence. St. Luke tells us simply that Jesus went down to Nazareth with Mary and Joseph and “was subject to them.” For many years, the Son of God lived the ordinary life of a family, sharing its work, routines and relationships.
Family life teaches us that love cannot remain an abstract sentiment. We live closely with people whose virtues and defects we know very well, just as they know ours. We have to learn patience when someone is tired, forgiveness when words are spoken badly and consideration for needs different from our own. Because familiarity removes many social restraints, the home is also where our character is most clearly revealed.
We may be unfailingly courteous to strangers and surprisingly inconsiderate toward those closest to us. We thank someone who serves us in a restaurant while scarcely noticing the many services performed for us every day at home. We control our irritation with colleagues but allow ourselves to speak sharply to family members because we assume they will understand. Christian charity asks us to reverse this tendency. The people closest to us should receive not the leftovers of our patience and courtesy but some of our best efforts.
St. Thomas Aquinas speaks of the virtue traditionally called affability, which orders our words and actions in our relationships with others. It is a virtue that can easily pass unnoticed because its expressions are usually ordinary. We notice its importance most clearly when it is absent. A person who is habitually abrupt, inconsiderate or difficult creates tension around himself, while someone who is approachable and attentive makes daily life easier for everyone.
Affability does not mean having a naturally outgoing personality. Some people are reserved, others talkative; some make friends easily, while others need more time. Christian virtue does not erase these differences. A reserved person can be deeply affable, just as a very sociable person can sometimes be inconsiderate. What matters is whether we make an effort to receive others well and avoid imposing our moods unnecessarily upon them.
Much of this virtue is expressed through good manners. Courtesy can seem superficial if we regard it merely as social convention, but when motivated by charity it becomes a simple way of recognizing the dignity of another person. Greeting someone, listening without interrupting, thanking people for what they do, arriving on time and avoiding unnecessary harshness in speech are small acts, but they communicate respect.
Our daily life contains countless opportunities of this kind. We encounter people in elevators, waiting rooms, stores, public transportation and many other places where the contact may last only a few moments. We may never see them again. Yet even a brief encounter can be made more human by patience, a greeting or some small consideration.
We do not need to turn every encounter into a conversation or force friendliness upon someone who wants to be left alone. Affability includes sensitivity to what is appropriate. Sometimes respect means speaking; at other times it means allowing another person space. The point is that we should not move through the world as though the people around us were merely part of the scenery.
This becomes more demanding with the people we see every day. Differences of temperament inevitably produce friction. One person may be methodical while another is spontaneous. Someone may speak directly while another is easily hurt. Some people need conversation and companionship; others need more solitude. If we expect everyone to react as we do, ordinary differences soon become sources of irritation.
Maturity requires us to make room for these differences. We should try to understand how another person experiences a situation rather than assuming that our own reaction is the only reasonable one. This does not mean that every behaviour should be accepted or that we should never correct anyone. It means that before judging, we try to understand.
People carry burdens that are not always visible. Someone who seems irritable may be worried about a family member or struggling with an illness. A person who appears distant may be shy rather than unfriendly. We cannot know everything taking place within another person, and for this reason we should be slow to interpret motives negatively.
Christ gives us the model. He saw people more deeply than anyone else could, yet his knowledge of their defects did not make him cynical. He knew Peter’s impulsiveness and future denial, the Samaritan woman’s disordered past and the ambitions of James and John. He saw the whole person and continued to love and form each one.
We often do the opposite. Once we discover a defect in someone, we allow it to dominate our view of the person. Everything he does is then interpreted through that weakness. If we think someone selfish, we notice every selfish act and overlook his generosity. If we consider someone difficult, even innocent remarks begin to irritate us.
Charity asks us to resist this narrowing of vision. Every person is more than his defects. We should try to see the good that is also present, not as an exercise in naïve optimism but because it is part of the truth. Most people are a mixture of strengths and weaknesses, generosity and self-interest, admirable qualities and limitations. We ourselves are no different.
Affability therefore requires a readiness to excuse and forgive. Life with other people inevitably brings annoyances. Words are misunderstood, promises forgotten and expectations disappointed. If every small offence causes our affection to cool, our relationships will become fragile and exhausting.
We need to learn which things should simply be overlooked. Not every irritating comment requires an answer, and not every disagreement needs to be resolved immediately. Many tensions disappear if we refuse to magnify them. Sometimes the most charitable response is to assume that the other person did not intend the offence we perceived.
There are, of course, situations that require correction. Charity does not mean avoiding difficult conversations or allowing serious problems to continue. But even then, affability remains important. St. Josemaría advised us to learn to disagree charitably without becoming unpleasant. Firmness and kindness are not opposites.
This is particularly important because we often become unpleasant precisely when we are convinced that we are right. The truth of our position can tempt us to excuse impatience or harshness. Yet a correct argument delivered contemptuously may do little good. If we genuinely want to help another person, the manner in which we speak matters.
Respect creates the conditions in which correction can be received. When people sense that we value them, they are more likely to listen even when what we say is difficult. If they feel humiliated or treated as inferior, they naturally become defensive. We cannot control how someone will respond, but we can make sure that our own intention is to help rather than dominate.
Gratitude also makes our relationships more pleasant. Much of what other people do for us is easy to take for granted precisely because it happens regularly. Someone prepares a meal, answers a request, keeps a common space in order or carries out a responsibility on which others depend. Because these services become part of the normal rhythm of life, we may stop noticing them.
A simple expression of thanks can make a considerable difference. It tells another person that his effort has been seen and appreciated. Gratitude also changes us because it turns our attention away from what we think others owe us and toward what we have received from them.
We should be especially attentive to this within the family. Years of faithful service can become almost invisible through familiarity. Parents, spouses, children and siblings may do innumerable things for one another that receive little acknowledgment. We do not need to thank people ceremoniously for every small act, but a home in which appreciation is expressed freely is very different from one in which everyone feels taken for granted.
Friendship gives warmth and depth to our ordinary relationships. Not everyone we meet will become a close friend, nor should we expect this. Yet we can try to bring something of the spirit of friendship into our dealings with the people around us. Instead of seeing someone merely as a colleague, neighbour or person who performs a particular function, we can take an interest in him as a person.
This requires a certain forgetfulness of self. If every conversation revolves around our own concerns, friendships remain shallow. We need to listen, remember what matters to others and rejoice in their good. Friendship grows when people sense that our interest is genuine and not simply a means of obtaining something from them.
There is also room for friendship across differences of age, background and opinion. Christ’s own friendships were remarkably varied. Christian charity enlarges the heart and helps us resist the tendency to associate only with people who resemble us. We can learn much from those whose experiences and personalities are different from our own.
Cheerfulness can contribute greatly to this atmosphere. This does not mean that we must always feel cheerful or hide genuine sorrow. There are times when sadness is entirely appropriate, and people who are suffering should never feel obliged to pretend otherwise. But we should try not to make others bear unnecessarily the weight of every passing bad mood.
Our moods affect the people around us. A person who habitually complains or reacts irritably to minor inconveniences can make an entire household or workplace tense. By contrast, someone who knows how to smile, keep difficulties in proportion and maintain a sense of humour often makes burdens easier for everyone.
Christian joy gives this cheerfulness a deeper foundation. It does not depend upon having an easy temperament or a life without problems. It comes from knowing that we are children of God and that our life remains in his hands. When this conviction becomes deeply rooted, it gradually affects the atmosphere we create around us.
Respect is perhaps the deepest foundation of affability. Every person we meet has been created in the image of God and possesses a dignity that does not depend upon whether we find him agreeable. This is especially important with people we naturally find difficult. It is easy to be considerate toward those whose company we enjoy. Charity is tested when we encounter someone whose temperament irritates us or whose opinions differ sharply from our own.
We do not have to pretend to feel an affection that is not there. Human sympathies cannot simply be commanded. But we can always choose respect. We can speak courteously, avoid unnecessary criticism and refuse to reduce someone to the qualities we dislike.
This distinction is important because Christian charity is broader than natural affection. We will never feel equally close to everyone, and friendship necessarily involves preferences. Christ himself had particular friends and allowed Peter, James and John to accompany him at moments when the other Apostles were not present. Yet particular affection never made him indifferent to anyone.
We too can have close friendships while remaining open to others. A strong circle of friends should not become a closed group that makes newcomers feel unwelcome. In a family, residence, workplace or community, we should notice those who may be isolated and make reasonable efforts to include them.
Sometimes a small gesture is enough. We introduce ourselves, invite someone into a conversation or sit beside a person who seems alone. We may never know what effect such an act has. Someone who appears self-sufficient may in fact be struggling with loneliness.
Our apostolate also depends greatly upon this human warmth. People are rarely drawn toward Christ by someone who seems perpetually severe or uninterested in them as persons. Friendship cannot be reduced to a technique for evangelization; it must be genuine. But genuine friendship naturally creates opportunities to share what matters most to us.
The first witness we often give is simply the way we treat people. Patience, courtesy, humour and sincere interest can make the faith visible before we have said anything explicitly religious. Others may begin to sense that Christianity does not close us in upon ourselves but enlarges our capacity to love.
This is why affability should never be dismissed as a minor virtue. It shapes a large part of daily life. Most of us will not often have opportunities for heroic acts of charity, but every day gives us opportunities to make life easier or harder for the people around us.
We can ask ourselves some simple questions. Do people generally feel at ease approaching us? Do we listen when they speak, or are we waiting for the opportunity to return to our own concerns? Do we notice the services others perform? How do we react when someone interrupts our plans or behaves in a way that irritates us?
The answers may reveal areas in which we need to grow. Perhaps we need to control impatience, complain less or show more gratitude. We may need to make a greater effort with someone we have begun to avoid because we find him difficult. These are not insignificant details. They are places where charity takes flesh.
Our Lady lived this spirit with extraordinary naturalness. At Cana, she noticed the embarrassment of the young couple before anyone asked for her help. During her visit to Elizabeth, she gave herself generously to her cousin’s needs. Her attention was directed toward others because her heart was centred on God.
We can ask her to help us acquire the same attentiveness. The people around us should not have to be perfect before we treat them well. We ourselves depend constantly upon the patience and forgiveness of others, and above all upon the mercy of God.
Following Christ means learning to look at people as he did. We see their defects without allowing those defects to define them. We respect their freedom, forgive their failures and try to discover the good that may not be immediately visible. A person who feels genuinely understood is more likely to open his heart and allow himself to be helped.
Affability ultimately grows from charity. Good manners alone can remain superficial, but when courtesy, kindness and consideration arise from love of God, ordinary social virtues acquire a supernatural depth. A greeting, a smile, an act of patience or a sincere thank-you can become a way of loving Christ in another person.
Much of our holiness will be built through these ordinary encounters. We may not remember them at the end of the day, and the people involved may scarcely notice what we have done. Yet through them we learn to come out of ourselves and make room for others.
Christ was approachable because his heart was open to everyone. People of very different backgrounds felt able to come to him because they sensed that he saw them as persons and cared about their good. If we remain close to him, something of that same openness should gradually become visible in us.
We will still have our temperament and preferences, and some people will remain easier for us to understand than others. Affability does not require us to become someone we are not. It asks us to allow charity to shape the person we already are so that our presence makes life a little easier for those around us.
This is a modest goal, but an important one. We can learn to listen more attentively, forgive more readily and be less governed by our moods. We can show gratitude for the services we receive and treat even difficult people with respect. In doing so, we imitate Christ, who never passed people by as though they did not matter. The ordinary human warmth with which we receive others can become one of the simplest and most convincing ways in which his charity is made present in the world.
*By the Via Virtutis team
Photo by Shaurya Sagar on Unsplash
