You are special

Each of us has the capacity, in this world as well as the next, to be Christ carriers.  Each of us can and does hold a piece of the divine. You and I are special, in fact everybody is special.  Everybody is valuable.  The Pope, the priest, but also the gutter snipe, the thief, the prostitute and the merchant banker. In fact all 7.2 billion souls on the planet are special and are made in God's image and hold or can hold a part of the divine.

It is because of this value that God came into the world, to reveal himself in the person of Christ, God gave us the possibility of salvation, the opportunity to be reunited with him.

The Gospel records the widows joy in finding the lost coin, the shepherd the joy at finding the lost sheep and the father's joy at receiving the prodigal son.  It reveals the joy of God over recovering just one soul to himself.

This is why Christians rejoice in the Cross something so terrible, yet it was transformed into a means of redemption for the whole human race.

In the Cross we can see that Christianity is not an abstract and spiritual religion. It springs from God’s direct intervention in the affairs of the world, a real historical event involving real people and, in the end, a real execution on a real cross. We may theorize and theologize all we like; but all our theorizings and theologizings are nothing without the history on which they are based. Take away that history – take away the Cross – and Christianity is nonsense.

Because our fallen brothers and sisters are special too, you and I are called, no obliged, to reach out and help them to redemption, draw them and society to Christ and to love.  Please God, give us the grace to do that.