The Hard Road

Last weekend was the Mass of thanksgiving for the high school graduation of my fourth son and his classmates. The priest’s homily focused mainly on the importance of being good men, men who take the hard road in life and not the easy one, which is so fashionable now. He spoke to them about the importance of being honest, and said it did not matter if they were called “nerds,” because only the hard road would give them true happiness.

The next day Pope Francis’s homily to young people in Paraguay focused on the same thing. The world is so corrupt that our pastors know that only if young people live Christian values can the world be changed.

I think it very important to spread this address by the Pope, because if there is something lacking in our country and in the whole world, it is speaking clearly to young people about the importance of following the hard road, since nothing does more harm than raising a young person to take the easy way out. Many of us have seen what happens to spoiled young people. And the plain truth is that we reap what we sow, and if we sow easy shortcuts, waste, complicity, comfort, corruption… it is very hard to reap anything good.

Below I copy part of Pope Francis’s address so that parents can read it calmly and reflect on it, and, if they can, give it to their children to read, or take the chance to read it together during these holidays.

“Dear young people:

It gives me great joy to be able to meet you in this festive atmosphere. To hear your testimonies and share your enthusiasm and your love for Jesus… Thank you, Manuel and Liz, for your courage in sharing your lives and your testimonies at this gathering. It is not easy to speak about personal things, especially in front of so many people. You have shared the greatest treasure you have: your stories, your lives, and how Jesus gradually entered into them.

To answer your questions, I would like to highlight some of the things you shared. Manuel, you told us something like this: ‘Today I have more than enough desire to serve others; I want to better myself.’ You went through very difficult times, very painful situations, but today you have a great desire to serve, to go out, to share your life with others.

Liz, it is not at all easy to become a mother to your own parents, especially when you are young, but what wisdom and maturity there is in your words when you told us: ‘Today I play with her, I change her diapers; these are all things I offer to God today, and I am only beginning to repay everything my mother did for me.’

You young Paraguayans are truly brave. You also shared how you managed to keep going, where you found strength. Both of you said: ‘In the parish.’ In your friends from the parish and in the spiritual retreats organized there. Two very important keys: friends and spiritual retreats.

Friends. Friendship is one of the greatest gifts a person, a young person, can have and can offer. It’s true. How hard it is to live without friends… One of the greatest secrets of the Christian lies in being friends, friends of Jesus. When you love someone, you stay by their side, you look after them, you help them, you tell them what you think, yes, but you don’t abandon them. That is how Jesus is with us; he never abandons us. Friends give each other strength, keep each other company, protect each other. That is how the Lord is with us. He gives us strength.

Spiritual retreats. Saint Ignatius has a famous meditation called the two standards. On one side he describes the standard of the devil and on the other the standard of Christ. It would be like the jerseys of two teams, and he asks us which one we would like to play for.

With this meditation he makes us imagine what it would be like to belong to one team or the other. It would be like asking ourselves: who do you want to play with in life? And Saint Ignatius says that to recruit players, the devil promises those who play with him wealth, honors, glory and power. They will be famous. Everyone will idolize them.

On the other hand, he presents Jesus’s game plan. Not as something fantastic. Jesus does not offer us the life of stars and celebrities; on the contrary, he tells us that playing with him is an invitation to humility, to love, to service of others. Jesus does not lie to us. He takes us seriously.

In the Bible the devil is called the father of lies. The one who promised, or rather made you believe, that by doing certain things you would be happy. And afterward you realized you were not happy at all. That you had chased after something that, far from giving you happiness, made you feel emptier and sadder.

Friends: the devil is a con artist, a seller of smoke. He promises and promises, but he gives you nothing; he will never deliver on anything he says. He is a bad payer. He makes you want things that do not depend on him, whether you get them or not. He makes you put your hope in something that will never make you happy. That is his game, his strategy.

Talking a lot, offering a lot and doing nothing. He is a great seller of smoke, because everything he proposes is the fruit of division, of comparing ourselves with others, of stepping on other people’s heads to get what we want. He sells smoke because the only way to reach all this is to set your friends aside and not keep anyone company. Because everything is based on appearances. He makes you believe your worth depends on how much you have.

On the other hand, we have Jesus, who offers us his game plan. He does not sell us smoke; he does not promise us seemingly great things. He does not tell us that happiness will be found in wealth, power or pride. On the contrary, he shows us that the road is a different one. This coach tells his players: Blessed, happy are the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those persecuted for righteousness’ sake. And he ends by telling them: rejoice in all this (cf. Mt 5:1-12).

Why? Because Jesus does not lie to us. He shows us a road that is life and truth. He is the great proof of this. It is his style, his way of living life, friendship, his relationship with his Father. And that is what he invites us to: to feel ourselves children. Beloved children.

He does not sell you smoke. Because he knows that happiness, true happiness, the kind that fills the heart, is not found in the clothes we wear, the shoes we put on or the label of a particular brand.

He knows that true happiness lies in being sensitive, in learning to weep with those who weep, in being close to those who are sad, in lending a shoulder, in giving a hug. Whoever cannot cry cannot laugh, and so cannot live. Jesus knows that in this world of so much competition, envy and aggression, true happiness comes through learning to be patient, to respect others, not to condemn or judge anyone.

‘Whoever gets angry loses,’ as the saying goes. Don’t give your heart to rage and resentment. Happy are those who show mercy. Happy are those who know how to put themselves in someone else’s place, who are able to embrace and to forgive. We have all experienced this at some time. All of us at some point have felt forgiven: how beautiful it is! It is like getting your life back, like having a new chance. There is nothing more beautiful than having new chances. It is as if life begins again.

That is why happy are those who bring new life, new chances. Happy are those who work for this, who fight for this. We all make mistakes, thousands of them. That is why happy are those who are able to help others in their mistakes and their errors. Who are true friends and don’t abandon anyone. Those are the pure in heart, those who manage to see beyond the mere blunder and overcome difficulties. Happy are those who see above all the good in others.

Liz, you mentioned Chiquitunga, this Paraguayan Servant of God. You said she was like your sister, your friend, your model. She, like so many saints, shows us that the way of the beatitudes is a way of fulfillment, a possible and real way. A way that fills the heart.

They are our friends and models who have already stopped playing on this ‘field,’ but they become those indispensable players we always look to in order to give our best. They are proof that Jesus is not a seller of smoke; what he offers is fullness. But above all, it is an offer of friendship, of true friendship, the friendship we all need. Friends in the style of Jesus. Not to stay among ourselves, but to go out onto the ‘field’ and make more friends. To spread the friendship of Jesus throughout the world, wherever you are: at work, at school, on WhatsApp, on Facebook or Twitter.

When you go out dancing or for a drink. In the town square or playing a pickup game on the neighborhood field. That is where Jesus’s friends are. Not selling smoke, but walking alongside others, giving encouragement and strength when it is needed. Because we know we are happy, because we have a Father who is in heaven.”

Thank you, Holy Father, for those wonderful words you spoke to the young people of Paraguay, which apply perfectly to the young people of Venezuela and of the whole world! May they all follow the hard road Jesus taught us, and not the easy road that evaporates, that runs out and leaves a person sunk in terrible unhappiness!