Be perfect

Anthony De Mello tells a story of a little town in America where people gathered in the evening to make music. They had a saxophonist, a drummer, and a violinist, mostly older people. They got together for the company and for the sheer joy of making music, even though they didn't do it very well. So they were enjoying themselves and having a good time, until one day they decided to get themselves a new conductor who had a lot of ambition and drive. The new conductor told them, "Hey folks, we need to have a concert for the whole town." Then he gradually got rid of some people who didn't play very well, hired a few professional musicians, got an orchestra into shape, and they got all their names in the newspaper. They eventually decided to move to the big city and play there. But some of the older people had tears in their eyes. They said, "It was so wonderful in the old days when we did things badly and enjoyed them".

Our culture is one that, at our birth, has instilled in us the impulse to continually never be satisfied with ourselves. There are times when this can be healthy for us, but most often it is one that destroys our esteem. Under the multitude of fads and obsessions are people who want to be simply themselves... completely, wholly, broken. Maybe that is what Jesus meant by saying "be perfect", or complete. God wants us to be whole humans, even as badly as we fail to be!