Friendships of virtue include elements of the other two friendships, but have a different goal. Virtue transforms the fruits of usefulness or pleasure. It leads to long-term fulfillment and participation in eternal love rather than short-term enjoyment.
The Sacrament of Virtuous Friendship
The journey of virtuous friendship starts with small steps. Let’s discuss a theology of these small, seemingly ordinary moments in light of some extraordinary moments. According to the Baltimore Catechism, a “sacrament” is traditionally defined as “an outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace.”16 At a minimum, the various Christian churches generally recognize two sacraments. At most, the Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox churches propose seven sacraments. Despite the number we believe to be correct, most Christians agree that God’s grace is not confined to these moments alone.17 We must ask, “What ordinary moments in our lives are sacramental?”
Loosely speaking, we could say any communal activity that is rooted in virtue and reflects the grace of God can be defined as “sacramental” (take note here of the lowercase “s”).
Catholic sacramental theologians scour the books of Scripture to identify the moments in which Jesus instituted each one of the seven Sacraments. During this search, they often overlook the smaller moments in the life of Jesus when the Holy Spirit bonded the friendships between the apostles. For instance, Jesus formed a group of virtuous friends who came to share in his mission. They walked, ate, drank, and talked with him. These same activities — walking, eating, drinking, and talking — are sacramental when they are transformed within virtuous friendships. These seemingly ordinary experiences are transformed just as our participation in the love of the Trinity transforms friendship. As virtuous friends we receive a number of new “sacraments”: the sacrament of friendship, the sacrament of table fellowship, and the sacrament of dialogue.
These sacraments also confer grace to anyone who is lucky enough to participate or be a witness. Think about the impact of this in light of the story of Reverend Steve and Father Martin. It emphasizes an important detail about how we understand friendship: The work between friends is no longer restricted to the secular world of usefulness or pleasure. It is central to the spiritual life! Jesus’ community of disciples is the ultimate example of sacramental friendship for all of us to follow. It is also a sacrament that we can share with Jesus, our friend.
Furthermore, the way we think about the sacrament of friendship is unlike the way we think about the other Sacraments. For instance, many Christians put the Sacraments on a pedestal. They emphasize their deep, seemingly unattainable, spiritual significance and forget about the simple physicality that is necessary for each one. We tend to focus on the saving power of Baptism rather than the water that is instrumental in bringing it about. We emphasize the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist and forget about the elements of bread and wine. In each example, we tend to forget that each sacrament requires a “visible sign,” some physical item, to accompany the “invisible grace.” It is important to ask ourselves, “What would happen if we looked at the Sacraments with a holistic approach, looking at both the ‘visible sign’ and the ‘invisible grace?’ ”
A sacramental view of life can help us break free from our restricted understanding of theology. Jesus teaches us, through the Sacraments, that spiritual realities are dependent, during our time on earth, on physical realities. Scripture reminds us that Baptism is dependent upon water. The Eucharist is dependent on bread and wine. Confirmation, Holy Orders, and Anointing of the Sick are dependent upon oil. The spiritual graces are dependent upon the physical symbols to act as vehicles of grace.
A restricted view of the Sacraments can be detrimental to the way we experience the world around us. It is hard to recognize the sacramentality of other experiences when we put the seven (or two) Sacraments on such a high spiritual plane. Many of us are convinced there is no reason to look elsewhere for God’s grace if we believe that the Sacraments contain the fullness of grace. “Why bother with these trees when I have the Eucharist?” “Why bother with friends when I have been saved by the water of Baptism?” This mindset has become a limiting factor for many Christians.
It is important, as friends, to encourage one another to recognize the grace of God in both the Sacraments and the sacraments. Friendship is a good place to start.
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We can all agree that the organic development of friendship is more prone to happen around organic substances: food, coffee, and beer. Coffee houses, restaurants, and bars can be seedbeds for virtue. Yet the presence of alcohol is not a requirement for friends of virtue (even though it may be heralded as a helpful “social lubricant”). In the previous types of friendship, alcohol was the object of desire that made a person useful or a conversation enjoyable. Friends of usefulness were kept around as long as the connections they provided us to alcohol or parties were strong. Friends of pleasure drank together, since doing so was enjoyable for everyone involved. Friends of virtue may still do all these things, but only as a byproduct of seeking fulfillment and the virtue of charity.
We have seen how simple conversations about shared ideals can lead to revolutionary movements. Small actions can have massive repercussions, and a few minutes spent discussing the flavors of a particular beer can become a few hours spent mulling over the complexities of all that life has to offer. If we want to experience these fruits of friendship, we must go out into the world and open ourselves up. We must get up from our armchairs and sit at the bar.
But a word of warning: We must be careful!
Friendships are risky.
Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall
Society labels free-climbers, cliff-divers, or other extreme sport enthusiasts as risk-takers. Why? These people share one thing in common: They put their physical well-being on the line for a few moments of exhilaration.
I must disagree with this popular definition of “risk” and say that friends of virtue are the real risk-takers. Each time we make a virtuous friend, we take a risk. Each time we make a virtuous friend, we take a risk. Friends do not risk their physical well-being. They risk their emotional, psychological, and social well-being.
Being a friend of virtue means opening ourselves to the possibility of being changed by our friend. This process of vulnerability begins by viewing the friend, in the words of Paul Wadell, “like a mirror.”18 We come face to face with ourselves when we look at our friend and, in this moment, we become vulnerable to recognizing our faults.
Think about the last time you looked into a mirror. You either saw what you wanted to see, projecting a set of invented hopes and desires on the reflection. Or you came face to face with reality. You saw things as they really were, imperfections and all.
Friends perform the same function as a mirror: They are mirrors into our deepest self. Sometimes we project a set of personal hopes and desires onto the friend. We expect them to act a certain way or say what we want to hear. Thomas Merton — author, mystic, and Trappist monk — described this situation: “We too avidly seek to find, in our friends and in the things we love, a reflection of our own superior excellence. But we are always disappointed.”19
On the other hand, if we allow it, our friends can show us who we really are. The friend, a true “other” and not a “reflection-of-me,” can change us in unexpected ways. At the same time, true friends also pull us out of our focus on ourselves. When this happens, we are able to see behind all the ideas we hold about them. They are no longer who they “should” be, but who they truly are and who they have always been. Seeing our friend as a unique being, free from our