St. Paul exhorts the early Christians to stop quarreling and to be “completely united with only one thought and purpose” (1 Corinthians 1:10). The “one thought and purpose” St. Paul had in mind was the following of Christ.

The goal of the Christian is to follow Christ, to see Christ in everyone regardless of differences. What a lesson this is for the liberals and the conservatives; the right wingers and the left wingers in our society today!

God wants us to be brothers and sisters united by a common purpose, not clones of one another. Physically, God did not make us look alike. One of the greatest miracles in life is how we are all alike: one nose, two ears, two eyes, etc., and yet, we are all different. Only God could create such infinite variety.

We differ, also, in the degree of our relationship with the same God. As in a family, all the children belong to the same parents and are brothers and sisters among themselves, yet their relationship to one another and to their parents is different. So it is in the family of God. We are all children of God, yet we are all different.

We must not try to hide our individuality but feel free to express it, always in consideration of our calling and that of others who are different from ourselves. We should never try to make others into images of ourselves or make ourselves into images of others. This is one of the great problems today. Most people are not themselves. They are other people in their form of dress, ideas and lifestyle. If you should be conformed to anybody or anything it should be to Christ, not the will of others. You are made in the image of God.

The ideal is to have a healthy respect for yourself and for others. As human beings, we are not self-sufficient. We must live to serve God and each other, and we must accept others as capable of meeting our needs. The prudent person is the one who knows how to help others and how to be helped in turn.

One of the great dangers today is disinterested individuality: treating others as mere objects, like “things” we can exploit. The way to combat this worldly thinking is to see Christ in each other, to love them the way Jesus loves you, and never to treat them as objects or means to an end.

For the Christian, the end is contained in the means; that is, all the steps or means you take with regard to others must be undeniably Christian. You cannot be of service to one another by using foul means. This means seeing Christ, not just in your friends, but in your enemies. (Luke 6:27–36)

It takes everyone working together to bring about UNITY. People complement one another just like one piece of a puzzle complements the whole.

We can be united in our love of God, and retain our individuality, by seeing Christ in everyone.

Such is the blessing of unity.

—Fr. Hugh Duffy