"Near Misses" On The Road To True Friendship

We continue to look at what Christian leaders in history have written on the vital subject of friendship, and especially the deep, pure heart bond that can be between Christians who have gone below the surface together.

Where better to start a new year, then, than with a real giant on the subject: Augustine of Hippo (354-430). Of all the Church Fathers, Augustine pondered the most on the matter of human relationships in general, and heart-friendships in particular. What makes him so readable on this - and on so much else - is the sheer humanity and honesty with which he wrote. His autobiographical Confessions make no attempt to cover his colourful pre-conversion life ("the madness of lust" made him live "a life in which I was seduced and seducing, deceived and deceiving").

His conversion experience at age 33 took place in the company of a friend, Alypius, and for the rest of his life he lived in various degrees of Christian community, surrounded by others, sharing his life with them. Some of these were particularly close to his heart. With hindsight, Augustine reassesses some earlier relationships which had seemed to be 'the real thing', but which proved not to be, as they were founded on two close but wrong 'cousins'. Let us consider two of these: sex and infatuation (or co-dependency).

In Books 3-6 of the Confessions we find a young woman, whom he does not name, who became the mother of his child. "I loved the idea of love", he writes, "but I muddied the clear spring of friendship with the dirt of lustful desire." The couple remained together for 13 years and the bond clearly went deep. When his faith led to a parting, "my heart, which clung to her, was broken and wounded and dripping blood." He adds that the woman never took another man. In a culture where the term "friend" was usually only applied to men, Augustine says a lot about this relationship by referring to his ex-partner as his "friend".

So sexual union is not the fulfilment of the heart's desire for friendship. In our day, when sex is billed as everything and leaves hearts broken and empty when it turns out not to be so, many may be wishing they could peep over the fence at what might be missing.

In Book 4 we read of a childhood friend in his native Tagaste (in modern Algeria). They were the same age and had played and gone to school together. The friendship with this lad continued into manhood. It was "sweeter to me than anything I had ever known. My soul could not be without him." Augustine was devastated when his friend died of a fever. "Tears took the place of my friend in my heart's love. I was in misery, for I felt that my soul and my friend's had been one soul in two bodies."

At this point, a 21st century reader may already be thinking "gay", even as the archetypal male heart-bond of David and Jonathan in the Bible is interpreted as "gay" in some circles today [1 Samuel 20:17; 2 Samuel 1:26]. But remember, such a branding of all same-sex attraction is an invention of the 19th century; it was not thought about that way in previous centuries and we must avoid crude retro-projections of modern interpretations.

More useful to us is Augustine's own judgement with the benefit of hindsight: "We depended too much on each other... He was not a friend in the true meaning of friendship." Here, then, is the second 'near miss' on the road to deep heart-friendship: the persuasive but largely mythical idea of the "bosom buddy" who will meet all your emotional needs and where the relationship seems almost instant, requiring no real hard work.

In the next few posts we'll look at what Augustine has to say about true heart-friendship.

The Blessings of Heart-Friendship, Part 3

Our final look at Anthusa / Chrysostom's On Ideal Friendship (late 4th century) begins with the letter-writer's question: How long shall we confine our love just to one or two people?

Love is such a productive thing! It turns an individual into a thousand. Why do we not take possession of this strength? It is better than all power and virtue, more than health, more than the light of day.

By way of a quotation from the Apocrypha [Ecclesiasticus 20:16, "A fool will say: I have no friend"], the writer turns the coin over and considers the lot of the friendless. Even among animals, the most savage and intractable are those which do not herd together. The friendless person is most pitiable. He may live in abundance and luxury, but without friends he is destitute and naked. Such a one also lacks protection. Not even the Emperor's bodyguards are as careful as one's true friends, for the former guard through fear of discipline, but the latter guard through love.

Answering an imaginary questioner, attention turns to monks and hermits. Surely, if they live in caves or on mountains, they haven't got friends? Chrysostom writes that these do indeed have friends. Admittedly, they have fled the tumult of the marketplace, but the friends whom they do have are true heart-friends, bound closely to them in Christ. For, just as zeal in business leads to many disputes, [monks and hermits] have left the world in order to cultivate godly love with greater strictness. They prove the strength of love in their fervent prayers.

The letter concludes - a trifle hurriedly, I thought - with the maxim: If we apply ourselves with due care to these precepts, we shall administer present things well and inherit the kingdom of God.

The full text of the Anthusa / Chrysostom letter can be found here.

The Blessing of Heart-Friendship, part 2

True heart-friendship, as introduced in my last post, cannot be learned by study, nor by any words of explanation, but only by the experience itself, Chrysostom / Anthusa continues. I know that many do not understand this. It is as if I were speaking of some plant growing in India, of which they have no experience. Language could not represent it, were I to utter ten thousand words. This plant has been in Heaven!

Perhaps the reason for this incomprehension has to do with the apparent contradictions of true friendship:

Whoever loves does not wish to command nor to rule, but feels more grateful being subject and being commanded. He wishes to confer favors rather than receive them. He is not so much delighted at experiencing kindness as at doing kindness. For he prefers to hold his friend bound to him, rather than he should be indebted to his friend: or, rather, he wishes to be indebted to him, and also to have him as a debtor.

Such a friendship is as dear as life itself. This is why many have not wished to live on after the death of one such friend. "With a friend anyone could willingly endure banishment; but without a friend no one would choose to inhabit even his own country. With a friend even poverty is bearable, but without him health and wealth are unbearable."

There follows a more complicated section where the writer considers the idea that to have a true friend is to have another self. In fact, it is like being ten people, not one. So in situations of conflict, an enemy attacks not merely one, but ten. When hardship comes, up to nine may suffer but one will still be secure and prosper.

Personally, I found this section rather overdone (twenty hands and feet, ten souls, etc.), but the point still stands: the enlarging and enriching power of true heart-friendship. See the excellence of godly love! How it causes one individual to be unconquerable and equal to many.

The Blessing of Heart-Friendship, Part 1

I continue to trawl through historical Christian writings on the subject of friendship. Next up is a fascinating piece with an obscure origin. It claims to be a letter to John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, from his mother, Anthusa, entitled On Ideal Friendship. It would date to the final quarter of the 4th century.

What complicates matters is that Anthusa is otherwise unknown and isn't referred to by any other Early Church writers as an ancient authority. Meanwhile, the bulk of the text of the letter can be found, almost word for word, in various of Chrysostom's own works, especially his Homilies. So we are probably looking at "John Chrysostom on Ideal Friendship".

The letter is not long and most of it is eminently quotable. In this post I'll look at the introduction and opening section. It speaks for itself.

The letter opens with a verse from the Apocrypha: "A faithful friend is a sturdy shelter," [Ecclesiasticus 6:14a], and the comment: Though you were to name a thousand treasures, there is nothing comparable to a real friend. The first section is then devoted to the pleasure that true friendship brings.

A friend overflows when he sees his friend. He is united to him in a union having a certain ineffable pleasure of the soul. If he merely thinks of him, he rises and is carried upwards in his mind. I speak of genuine friends, who are of one accord, of those who would choose to die for their friends, of those who love warmly.

A true friend is such that places and times are loved on his account. For, as shining objects shed a lustre upon the adjoining places, even so friends impart their own grace to the places they have been. And oftentimes, when standing in those places without our friends, we have wept and groaned, remembering the days when we were there together.

The writer notes that those who have known the beauty of such a depth of heart-friendship will instinctively understand this, but that such people are relatively few. "When (such friends) make a request of us, we are grateful to them, but when they are slow to ask, then we are sad. We have nothing which is not theirs. It would be better to live in darkness than to be without friends. And how can I say this? Because many who see the sun are in darkness."

I speak of the spiritual friends who set nothing above friendship. Such was Paul, who would willingly have given his own soul, without having been asked, and would have willingly fallen into Hell for his brethren [Romans 9:3]. With so burning an affection is it proper to love. Take this as an example of friendship. Friends surpass fathers and sons, that is, friends according to Christ.

Anger, the Scourge of Relationships

We continue with John Cassian's Conference 16: On Friendship, of around AD 415. Abbot Joseph, writing from within a monastic context, is clear on one thing:

Nothing is more damaging (to true friendship) than anger and vexation. Our enemy, the devil, sows the seeds of discord even between spiritual persons, on the ground of some difference of thinking. Therefore it is of no use to have removed the first ground of discord, which arises from the outward things of this world, unless we also cut off the second, which arises from wrong feelings. In everything we must gain humble thoughts and harmonious wills.

He goes on to look at the subtle differences between love and affection. Perhaps surprisingly, Joseph maintains that "agapé" love (the New Testament word for Christ-like, self-sacrificing love) can be shown by Christians to anyone, on the basis of "doing good to all people, especially those who are of the household of faith" (Galatians 6:10). Genuine heart-affection, however, he sees as shown only to a few: those who are united to us by kindred dispositions or by a tie of goodness. There are levels to this, he points out, and they are variable: not all parents love their children to the same degee.

The remainder of Conference 16 is concerned with a more specifically monastic danger: of conforming and going through the motions of true brotherly affection, when the heart has lost the desire for it. There may be applications here for us, not least for married couples, but the detail of Abbot Joseph's discourse does not belong to our theme here.

Still, it all made an impression on Cassian and Germanus, who conclude: Thus the blessed Joseph discoursed on spiritual friendship, and fired us with a more ardent desire to preserve the love of our fellowship as a lasting one.

The True Foundation of Friendship

First up in my trawl through historical Christian writers on friendship is John Cassian (c.360-435). As a young man, he was greatly exercised over how to live a godly life with true brotherhood. So he and his best friend, Germanus, travelled from his native Romania to visit the hermitages and monasteries of Palestine and Egypt.

While here, Cassian documented the structures, lifestyle and teachings of the Desert Fathers. Years later, in 415, when he himself was abbot of a monastery near Marseille, he published these under the title Conferences. They are a seminal tool for the student of early monastic life. For this blog post, what concerns us is Conference 16: The First Conference of Abbot Joseph, on Friendship .

Joseph first looks at many kinds of friendship outside the Christian framework, which can be motivated by self-interest, nepotism, the longing for recognition, or selfish desires. True Christian friendship, on the other hand, he sees as founded on two things: like-mindedness and a common purpose.

"Love can only continue undisturbed in those in whom there is but one mind, to will and to refuse the same things. This is the sure and indissoluble union of friendship, where the tie consists only in being alike in goodness and having a union of character in God."

For such friendship to come into being, Joseph tells Cassian, "whatever things the world might offer cannot be regarded more highly than what is most valuable: love of a brother. Everything, even what one deems useful and necessary, must be subordinate to the blessing of love and peace. Realising that, all too soon, one must pass from this world, one cannot permit any vexation to linger in the heart."

"For if one is walking along the the path outlined above, how can he ever differ from his friend, if he claims nothing as his own and entirely cuts off the first cause of any quarrel. He observes to the best of his power what we read in the Book of Acts: The company of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common (4:32)."

A Friend Indeed?

Loneliness is the most terrible poverty. Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

Back to the blog after quite a lay-off, but the various strands that make up community are still very much uppermost in my thinking. Today I want to turn to the matter of FRIENDSHIP.

"I don't know why but I just can't make 'real' friends very easily. I feel lonely all the time," writes a 20 year old to Yahoo Answers. The advice in this case (join a sports club) struck me as a complete travesty. OK, the malaise might be temporary, a teenage angst, so joining a club might sort it. But surely the issue is much deeper and more existential, reaching to the deepest parts of our conscious human need.

Jesus Christ knew how vital friendship was. He became a friend to the friendless and unwanted (Luke 7:34). As He neared the end of His earthly walk, He reserved the highest accolade for His inner circle: "I have called you my friends" (John 15:15). And most telling of all, in the horror of his own personal agony in Gethsemane, He wanted His closest friends near Him - and opened His heart to them in the most open, vulnerable way (Mark 14:33-34).

With this in mind, it is certainly surprising that Christian writers down the ages have been remarkably silent on the subject of true friendship, heart-brotherhood and the like. In the next few posts I hope to unearth some of what has been produced on the subject and see how it feeds into the desperate need in our own society today.