Throughout our lives we depend on others physically. From the time we are conceived through our first few years as a small child we totally depend on our mother and others to feed, clean and nurture us. If we did not have that care we would die. At the end of our days on earth we go back to needing the care of a child. Think about all the ways we depend on others for our physical lives between birth and death. We depend on those feeding us food to give us nutrition and for it not to kill us. We depend on nurses, dentists and doctors to heal us. We depend on oncoming traffic to stay on their side of the road. We depend on the armed services to protect us. In these and all the ways we depend on others for our physical lives, we see how vulnerable we are.

How do we find the deepest needs of our hearts like friendship, belonging, acceptance and love? We have to depend on others in order to receive their friendship and love. Through our experiences we know this is perhaps the most vulnerable thing we do in life- to put our lives into the hands of another and say, “Love me.” What happens when that love is broken? As we approach Good Friday, we know that some of Jesus’ most intimate friends utterly denied and betrayed him when he needed them most.

Put yourself in the place of Peter or Judas during the last week of Jesus’ life on earth. Jesus depends on you to be his friend, especially when your life is on the line for doing so. What kind of friend will you be to Jesus if this happens in your life? Generally, what kind of friend are you to Jesus? Isn’t it mind bottling that Jesus, the perfect friend, asks us, the broken sinner, to be his friend? Could anyone ever be more vulnerable in a relationship than Jesus who asks us to love him in friendship?

Why should we depend on another if they are just going to end up failing you? Why make ourselves venerable if it is going to open you up to being hurt again at the deepest level of the heart? In light of the potential ways we broken human beings can hurt one another, it seems valid and logical to choose being independent from one another rather than exposing ourselves to potential hurt. The difficulty with this logic is that it goes against the way God has set it up for us to experience our deepest needs being met. It is only through staying vulnerable by depending and relying and receiving from others that we can come into the love he has created us for.

Just like we depend on others to care for us physically throughout our lives, we look to them spiritually to share with us the unseen love and friendship of God. We must always remember, however, that we share those deepest needs in sometimes very broken ways that can lead to hurt. When the hurt happens, the goal is not to give up our vulnerability, dependency and sharing. How do we do this? What keeps us from becoming independent from others so that we can avoid the pain of fractured love that is part of all human relationships?

We are able to remain vulnerable and dependent on others by first and always being totally dependent on Jesus who asks us to be his friend. He is the perfect sharer of friendship, love, acceptance and belonging and it is through his pouring out that in our hearts that we will have the grace to depend on others who are doing their best to offer that to us. As we remember that others are not perfect but that Jesus is, we can continue to be vulnerable to one another knowing Jesus will make up what is lacking in our love for one another.

God’s will!
+Fr. John