I like very much the passage in which the Lord asks his own: "And you, who do you say that I am? And Peter... with great strength says 'You are the Son of God'. The Lord blesses him and makes him the Stone on which the Church will be built; but immediately Peter is admonished by Jesus with harsh words: 'Get behind me, Satan, get behind me' (Mt 16:13-23).
In this text we can see perfectly what Jesus is like. He has chosen Peter, he knows what he is like, his virtues, dedication and strength, but he also knows his poverty and limitations... He knows that, at times, he is a coward and allows himself to be led by merely human criteria...
But that does not prevent him from placing his trust in him, from entrusting his Church to him. This bold, firm, audacious Peter is also cowardly, sinful and fragile, and he will be 'the sweet Christ on earth' as St. Catherine of Siena called the Pope.
We do not love priests, religious men and women, bishops or the Pope for their virtues. We love them knowing that, like Peter, they are people, with limitations and poverty, but with a desire for holiness and to love God, even if they are not obvious because of their poverty... we love them because the Lord has chosen them! The Lord does not regret having called them?
And the same with our missionaries: they are not perfect, they do not have the patent of impeccability... they are what they are, with all the good and all the bad that this entails... but the Lord has chosen them. They are light, they are salt, they are leaven that illuminates, gives good taste and makes the world to which they have been sent ferment... We do not only look at their poverty or their limitations, many or few... we will pray for them, we will have to look at them with eyes of mercy and charity!
They are there not to preach themselves, their science or their opinions, but to preach Christ and Christ crucified. We do not pretend to imitate them, but the one they preach: Jesus Christ.
