Precious life

As I watch my favored K-dramas, I am struck time and time again by the phrase: he is someone's precious son or she is someone's precious daughter, even when describing a "despicable" character.  There is a constant reminder (is it just the way that it translates?) over and over again that every person is someone's precious person. What if we spoke like that in our every day conversations? What if we paused for a moment before saying anything denigrating and thought, "wait a minute, I might disagree with or I might have been wronged by him/her, but he/she is someone's precious child". Because every person is a precious child of God (whether or not they believe that, it is Truth).

This struck me so vividly this morning as I watched Jung Il Woo as the king in Haechi commenting on how he would not forget all the precious lives that were shed in order to protect their country. As Catholics, we remember the precious lives of saints that have gone before us or precious lives of people who have been martyred by terrorists or even the precious lives of the unborn babies who have been tossed aside. But do we think of every single person that we encounter in life as someone's precious person? I am definitely guilty of this. However, I do remember times within my classroom (very rarely, I might add) where I would be trying to figure out a positive regarding a rude disrespectful, disruptive child and the best that I could do was "his mother loves him/her so there must be something that I am not seeing".  I should have been thinking instead "God loves this precious child so, therefore, you should too".

I am watching a character beg for the life of one of these "despicable" people because that person is precious to him. This is Easter week. Shouldn't we be thinking about the sacrifices that Jesus made for us because we all are his precious people? Doesn't His heart truly hurt when he sees any of us behaving badly towards his loved ones? That doesn't mean that you can't disagree with or acknowledge that someone is doing something morally wrong or even judge them in a court of law - it means that they must take responsibility for their actions but you must allow them the opportunity to make amends and to ask forgiveness for the sake of their souls. Pray for them. Remember that even the most "despicable" of people is a precious child of God.

We don't know what anyone has suffered through or been exposed to in this cruel world. But each one of us can be the light of love for someone else. We can turn things around when the world seems ruled by hate to create a little corner of selfless love for someone's precious person. Be that light.