List of points

There is a certain type of secularist outlook that one comes across, and also another approach which one might call 'pietistic', both of which share the view that Christians somehow are not fully and entirely human. According to the former, the demands of the Gospel are such as to stifle our human qualities; whereas for the latter, human nature is so fallen that it threatens and endangers the purity of the faith. The result, either way, is the same. They both fail to grasp the full significance of Christ's Incarnation, they do not see that 'the Word was made flesh', became man, 'and dwelt amongst us'.

My experience as a man, as a Christian and as a priest, teaches me just the opposite. There is no human heart, no matter how deeply immersed in sin, which does not conceal, like embers among the ashes, a flicker of nobility. Whenever I have sounded out such hearts, talking to them individually with the words of Christ, they have always responded.

In this world of ours there are many people who neglect God. It may be that they have not had an opportunity to listen to his words, or that they have forgotten them. Yet their human dispositions are honest, loyal, compassionate and sincere. I would go so far as to say that anyone possessing such qualities is ready to be generous with God, because human virtues constitute the foundation for the supernatural virtues.

It is true that in themselves such personal qualities are not enough, for no one is saved without the grace of Christ. But if a man fosters and cultivates the seeds of virtue within him, God will smooth out his path, and such a person will be able to become holy because he has known how to live as a man of good will.

You may perhaps have noticed other cases which are in a certain sense just the opposite; so many people who call themselves Christians because they have been baptised and have received other sacraments, but then prove to be disloyal and deceitful, insincere and proud, and… they fail to achieve anything. They are like shooting stars, lighting up the sky for an instant and then falling away to nothing.

If we accept the responsibility of being children of God, we will realise that God wants us to be very human. Our heads should indeed be touching heaven, but our feet should be firmly on the ground. The price of living as Christians is not that of ceasing to be human or of abandoning the effort to acquire those virtues which some have even without knowing Christ. The price paid for each Christian is the redeeming Blood of Our Lord and he, I insist, wants us to be both very human and very divine, struggling each day to imitate him who is perfectus Deus, perfectus homo.

In order to practise the human virtues, we need to make a sustained effort, since it is not easy to maintain a spirit of honesty and integrity for any length of time when faced with situations that seem to put our own safety at risk. Take truthfulness, a virtue so clean and pure. Can it be true that it has fallen into disuse? Has the practice of compromise, of 'gilding the pill' and 'putting on a show' finally triumphed? People are afraid of the truth and to justify their attitude they make the shabby excuse that no one practises or tells the truth any more, that everyone has to resort to pretence and lies.

Fortunately this is not so. There are many people, Christians or not, who are ready to sacrifice honour and reputation for the sake of the truth, people who aren't always feverishly turning this way and that in search of 'the warmest place in the sun'. These are the very people who, because they love the truth, are happy to put things right when they discover they have made a mistake; whereas those who begin by lying, those for whom the truth has become merely a high-sounding word to cover up their baseness, such people refuse to make amends.

Naturalness and simplicity are two marvellous human virtues which enable men to take in the message of Christ. On the other hand, all that is tangled and complicated, the twisting and turning about one's own problems, all this builds up a barrier which often prevents people from hearing Our Lord's voice. Remember Christ's reproach to the Pharisees: they had enmeshed themselves in a maze-ridden world which made them pay tithes of mint, dill and cumin, while neglecting the most essential duties of the law, of justice and of faith. They were careful to strain everything they drank so as not to let even a mosquito pass, and they ended up swallowing a camel.

No. Neither the decent human lives of those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ, nor the lives of Christians, should be odd or strange. The human virtues which we are considering today lead us, each and every one of them, to the same conclusion. That man is truly human who strives to be truthful, loyal, sincere, courageous, temperate, generous, serene, just, hard-working, patient. Such behaviour may be difficult to achieve, but it can never be strange. If some people find it surprising, it is because their eyes have grown dim and they are clouded by a hidden cowardice and a lack of determination.

Once a person is striving to improve in the human virtues, his heart is already very close to Christ. If he is a Christian, he will realise that the theological virtues (faith, hope and charity) and all the other virtues which God's grace brings with it are an encouragement never to neglect the good qualities he shares with so many of his fellow men.

The human virtues are, I insist, the foundation for the supernatural ones. These in turn provide us with constant encouragement to behave as good human beings. In either case, it is not sufficient merely to want to have these virtues. We have to learn how to practise them. Discite benefacere, learn to do good. We need to make a habit of exercising each virtue, by actually being sincere, truthful, balanced, calm and patient… for love is proved by deeds and we cannot love God only by word, but 'with deeds and in truth'.

If we live our lives in this way, we shall be bringing peace to the world. We shall be making God's service attractive to others, because 'God loves a cheerful giver'. Christians are ordinary people, but their hearts overflow with the joy that comes when we set out to fulfil, with the constant help of grace, the will of the Father. Christians don't see themselves as victims, underrated, or restricted in their behaviour. They walk head on high, because they are men and children of God.

Our faith brings out the full meaning of these human virtues, which no one should ever neglect. Christians should be second to none as human beings. Those who follow Christ are able (not by their own merit but by the grace of God) to communicate to those around them what they at times suspect but cannot quite grasp: that true happiness, a genuine spirit of serving our neighbour, can only come by passing through the Heart of our Redeemer, perfectus Deus, perfectus homo.

Let us turn to Mary, our Mother, and the most excellent creature ever fashioned by God's hands. Let us ask her to make us humanly good so that our human virtues, woven into the life of grace, may become our best way of helping those who, with us, are working in the world to bring peace and happiness to all men.