The Responsible Person

If the real responsible person, in the Church or in the world, talks about people’s tribulation, he does not settle for describing their conditions. I can give multiple examples of our forgoing this reality in responsible positions. However, the word is straightforward. The responsible person always transcends the description to the commands of action. We all know that the economic crisis, to which we have fallen victim in Lebanon in these recent years, we have dealt with it in two shameful ways, with hurtful simplification and fatal parsimony. At the beginning of the crisis, I heard one of the elder brethren expressing his hope that the establishments’ owners will consider their employees as their partners in bread and salt. He said, literally: “this is not a time for material gain, but for the life of communion which is our salvation in all circumstances”. I know people who have sought this hope. However, most of us have not prevailed against the disease of self-love. Only the one who is truly aware that God has entrusted him with the lives of people on earth is a responsible person.