Friends on Earth and in Heaven

Our Cistercian Fathers like speaking about the benefits and sweetness of spiritual friendship. Often, they
refer to Jesus’ friendship with Martha, Mary, and Lazarus of Bethany—the saints we celebrate today. They say that Jesus’ earthly friendships sanctified friendship itself and made it a form of preparation for encountering and welcoming the Lord. How? Saint Aelred explains the process in greater detail in his book on Spiritual Friendship. He gets practical, as monastic writers usually like to do, and offers ways to discern and form good friendships. In an earlier work, The Mirror of Charity, Aelred explains briefly one of the great benefits of friendship: my friend’s soul and good heart give me extra space to welcome the presence of God. In my friend, I can possess graces that would be a bit too much for me on my own. This would be part of the joy in heaven, don’t you think? There, our capacity to receive God’s love, beauty, truth, and goodness would be increased tremendously as we will live forever in the communion of saints! These are Saint Aelred’s words, “All together, we will be capable of enjoying it to a greater extent than each one could singly, so a person’s blessedness will surely be more abundant if, having less capacity for it in himself, he begins to possess in another what he cannot have in himself.”

Martha, Mary, and Lazarus of Bethany, friends of Jesus, intercede for us so that we can build up solid and holy friendships which will support us on the way to heaven. In Christ we will be friends forever!

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