Concern for the lost

THE lesson we can draw from the parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin (cfr. Lk 15,1-10) is very clear. We need to give special attention and exert special effort to recover those who have lost their way toward God. This is the real test of discipleship.

We obviously need some special training for this. But let’s not forget that the first thing to do is to beg for that grace and power of God so we can carry out this duty that is clearly beyond our human powers and condition.

In our prayer, we should ask God to instill in us this strong urge to be concerned for those who have strayed from the proper way, those who for one reason or another are ostracized and alienated from God and from the rest of humanity.

With God’s grace, let’s embark on a plan to develop the appropriate attitude, virtues, skills and practices. Yes, we have to learn how to be “all things to all men to save at least some,” as St. Paul once said. (cfr. 1 Cor 9,22)

Definitely this would require of us a very open spirit that would enable us to adapt ourselves to everyone in the way they are, warts and all. Thus, we need to develop the qualities of adaptability, flexibility and versatility. With our increasingly complex times, we need to learn how to flow with the tide without losing our identity and real purpose in life. For this, we definitely need to look and follow closely the example of Christ.

Christ, being God, made himself man and went all the way to assume the sinfulness of men without committing any sin if only to identify himself with us in our wounded condition and to give us a way of how to deal with that condition.

In his preaching, he used parables to make his lessons more accessible to the people. He was always compassionate, quick to forgive, slow to anger. He was always thinking both of his Father and of the people. Remember him saying, “The one who sent me is true and what I heard from him I tell the world.” (Jn 8,26)

He gave preferential treatment to the children, the weak, the handicapped, the sick, the sinners. He was only allergic to the proud and self-righteous whose sense of right and wrong did not come from God, but rather from their own selves in their great variety of human consensus and other subtle forms of self-assertion. But on the cross, he asked forgiveness for everyone.

Obviously, to have this genuine concern for the lost, we need to be tough spiritually, not squeamish, much less, self-righteous. We should not be afraid to get the “smell,” as Pope Francis once said, of the lost sheep. If we are truly involved in the life of those who are lost and far from Church, we cannot avoid acquiring that “smell.”

Of course, without compromising our need also to be tender and gentle, we have to learn how to be strong and tough with the strength and forcefulness of true charity that would enable us how to bend, to understand and to forgive.

It’s a matter of discernment and prudence. They actually can and should go together—our toughness and gentleness. But their manifestations vary according to the situation, and we just have to learn how to show and live both anytime, or highlight one over the other given the circumstance or the need of the moment.