WE HAVE to be more aware of this most important duty that is actually incumbent on everyone of us, and not just on some special people. We know that we are all interrelated, obviously not biologically that only has a limited scope, but definitely to a large extent, politically, economically, socially, etc. The fact that we all live in the same one world somehow makes us all interrelated.
But there’s actually a more radical basis of our interrelation. And that is that we are all creatures of God, children of his, meant to be the people and the family of God. It is a relationship that is spiritual more than material, forged by a supernatural principle and not just something natural.
This basic truth about ourselves gives rise to the duty that we have to help one another spiritually more than anything else. It is in our spiritual bond that actually gives rise to all our other relations with everybody else according to the different aspects of our nature.
This is what is meant by our duty to inspire others. Etymologically, the word ‘inspire’ means to breathe into. And it definitely is not only air that we should breathe into others. We have to breathe a spirit that in the end is nothing other than the spirit of God, who is the original inspirator.
Obviously, we have to see to it that that we inspire others properly. And by that, we mean that the spirit we ‘breathe into’ the others by our mere presence or by our words and deeds, should be the spirit of God.
In other words, to inspire is to infuse the spirit proper to us, the spirit that gives us life and that animates our thoughts, desires, words and actions. And that spirit is ultimately nothing other than the spirit of God who is our Creator and Father. We need to correspond to the spirit of God.
Let’s be wary of the fact that there are actually many kinds of spirits that we can ‘breathe into’ the others. There is the spirit of God, the spirit of Christ as opposed to the antichrist. There is also the evil spirit, and the spirit of the world that is dominated by the evil one, and the spirit of the flesh.
St. Paul distinguished between the fruits of the Spirit of God and the works of the flesh dominated by the evil spirit. The former include love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. (cfr Gal 5, 22-23)
The latter include fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing. (cfr Gal 5, 19-21)
We have to see to it that we are always inspiring others properly. Wherever we are, whatever we are doing, let’s be conscious of this duty to inspire others properly. Let’s not pursue our work or whatever it is that we are doing at the moment without considering this duty of having to inspire the others properly.
We should also remember that even in our most hidden condition, we can still inspire others because of the spiritual bond we have with everybody. This spiritual bond is not limited by space and time. It’s not even limited by whether we are conscious of this bond or not. This bond is always at work.
May we take this duty to properly inspire others seriously!/PN
