By. Fr. Juan Carlos Aguirre

"If I speak in human and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal" (1 Cor. 13:1). Love is intrinsically needed for the fulfillment of the human person. However, it may seem in our society that such is not the case. According to José Ortega y Gasset, the vocation of man is found in his doings instead of in his being. "Life is in itself insipid because it is only a being-there. Therefore, man's own existence becomes a poetic journey, dramatic or novelistic, to create an argument for his existence". In our contemporary world it is not surprising to find people who see productivity as equivalent to the meaning of life. It is often said, "tell me what you produce and I will tell you who you are." The dignity and value of the human person is found in his doings. As a result, some human interactions, including that of friendship, may become utilitarian and pragmatic. This mentality has caused a drastic change in our concept of friendships, calling for a reflection on human interactions and, in particular, friendships; for it has been believed that friendships bring some kind of joy to the human person that other selfish, material or pragmatic "goods" cannot.

 

I am speaking on friendship based upon the following two questions; first, whether friendships are needed for human development? Second, whether all friendships are good? In the latter I will reflect on the relationship of love and friendship and the different types of friendships with their characteristics. I will conclude that virtuous friendships are objectively needed for the attainment of human happiness and that such attainment could bring man towards the fulfillment of his vocation in life.

"What are Friends For?"

The problems we face when we try to define friendship is its object of existence, or basically, "what are friends for?". Are friends necessary for happiness? it would seem that friends are not necessary for happiness.  For according to Aquinas, "happiness means the attainment of a perfect good" (I-II Q.5 Art. 1). This perfect good is God. Thus Aquinas also says that "friendship is not a necessary requirement for happiness since man has in God all the fullness of his perfection" (I-II Q.4 Art. 8). Therefore friends are not necessary for happiness.

 

On the contrary, Scripture says, "A faithful friend is a sturdy shelter; he who finds one finds a treasure...A faithful friend is a lifesaving remedy" (Sirach 6:14, 16). That which is "lifesaving" is needed for happiness. Therefore friendships are needed for happiness.

"Friends Help us Be Happy and Good"

 

Friends are needed for happiness in so far as they lead us to the Eternal Good, which is God. The moral good which we are striving to possess, and which our souls thirst for, is a good that exists outside of ourselves. Aristotle idea of happiness was the attainment of eudaimonia, which in itself calls for nothing more because it is considered an end. We cannot say of "eudaimonia that...[we] seek it for the sake of anything else," however, we can say of "anything else that [we] seek it for the sake of eudaimonia".

We need friends because they are independent of our freedom and our will. We can choose for the good only when that which is good is presented to us.   We are spiritual beings not only machinery that tends to interact with others only by means of productivity. The deepest foundation for our inclination to life in society lies in our human end for friendship, affection, or love.

 

We need to seek a deeper reason in our spiritual sense. Our spiritual sense has an intrinsic need for other people because, we are not isolated free choosers, monarchs of all we survey, we are benighted creatures sunk in a reality whose nature we are constantly and overwhelmingly tempted to deform by fantasy.

 

The pursuance of the good in life, therefore, requires friendships because, in order to avoid being deceived by fantasy we need "the ongoing presence of another [person] who not only shares that good, but in relationship with whom the good can be received.

Since morality is the pursuit of a good capable of making us whole, morality is possible only because there are other persons. That is the reason why friendships are so delightful: they put goodness within our reach.

When Aquinas mentions friendships as needed for happiness, he makes two distinctions. First, in this life, man needs friends not to delight in them, for only God is the source of delight,,

 

...but for the purpose of good operation, viz., that he [man] may do good to them; that he may delight is seeing them do good; and again so that he may be helped by them in his good work. For in order that man may do well, whether in the works of active life, or in those of the contemplative life he needs the fellowship of friends. (I-II Q.4 Art. 8).

 

Second, if we speak of Perfect Happiness, that which can only be achieved in the eternal life, "the fellowship of friends is not essential to happiness; since man has the entire fullness of his perfection in God" (I-II Q.4 Art. 8).

 

Thus we have seen that friendships are needed in this life so that we may attain perfection and an objective view of the Good. In this category, one should note, friendship is the only attainable good in this life which can lead us to God. The New Catholic Encyclopedia says that Cicero believed that "other goods such as riches, health, power, and honor are uncertain and detectable...Only friendship is enduring because it is based upon virtue" (204). In the prima secundae, question four,  Aquinas mentions all the above "goods" as not directed towards happiness; only friendship is a means towards God in this life.

 

The object of our lives is found in the love we give God. This love is exercised in this life in union with the love we give our neighbor. Jesus said, "Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind... [and] you shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Mt. 22:37, 39). The virtue of friendship is an outward expression of the virtue of love or charity. The question that comes next when speaking of the virtue of friendship is that of Love. 

"Not just any love would do"

There are two kinds of love or charity that we can reflect upon: one is uncreated and the other is created. Uncreated charity is related to that Eternal Good, which is God. "God is Love" (1 Jn. 4:8). The entire Trinity is called charity just as it is called Wisdom, Truth, and so forth. On the contrary, we have created charity; this is directed towards "our neighbor as to ourselves." This is only true by means of participation; as St. Paul's letter to the Romans says, "the love of God has been poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit that has been given to us" (5:5). Thus this created virtue of charity is infused by God, through which we love God, the author of our beatitudes, on account of his own goodness, and our neighbor, on account of God. Thus, within the theme of friendship, the radical relationship of one person to another is intended so as to fulfill the commandment, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

 

In the created kind of love, there is a diversity of types of love. Aquinas says, "To love...is to want someones good; so its object is twofold: the good we want, love with a love of desire (amor concupiscentiae), and the someone we want it for (ourselves or someone else), loved with a love of friendship (amor benevolentiae)" (McDermott, p.205). For example, if I say that I love wine, I do not mean that is the same as to say I love my friend. The difference is that one kind of love sees the object as the good which it produces and thus is a love of desire, as in the case of wine. However on the love of friendship, the object of love is the other or the self, that is, I love the other person as I love my self, because he is a creature of God, and thus he is the object of my love.

 

To love our neighbor and our self on account of God changes the object of friendship. Aquinas says,

True love wills good to someone. If the someone is yourself, then love seeks a unity with the good you want; if it is someone else, then love creates a community with him, for you treat him as yourself, willing his unity with the good as you would your own (cf. McDermott, p.54).

Not all friends are the same

This point invites us us to reflect on kinds of friendship. At first glance, it would seem that all friendships are good because in some way or another to love a neighbor is considered virtuous, and that which is virtuous is good. On the contrary, Scripture says, "One sort of friend is a friend when it suits him, but he will not be with you in time of distress" (Sirach 6:8). Therefore, not all kinds of friendships are good. A friendship, therefore, like a love, should be evaluated according to its object or the goal of a particular friendship.

 

With this in mind, Aristotle says, friendship can be divided in three kinds. Utility, pleasure, and virtue.

 

Useful Friends

Aristotle says that those who love a person for utility, "love the other not in himself, but in so far as they gain some good for themselves for him" (Ethics, 9.32). "The idea of the end is clearly linked with a desire, as being its object" (cf. Pinckaers, 415).  In this kind of friendship, the relationship is based on a common desire, which places people together. I can say that the doctor is my friend. However, this friendship is only in so far as I am a patient and he is my doctor. This type of relationship continues until the cause of being friends is removed, i.e. getting healthy. Aristotle would continue saying that this friendship does not last long enough, "For sometimes they do not even find each other pleasant" (Ethics, 9.33). When the reason for this type of friendship is not present, the relationship ends, because that which gave us pleasure, ended with its purpose, for example, the doctor's advise is no longer bringing healing and therefore it is not longer pleasant.

Pleasant Friends 

The second type of friendship is very similar to the one of utility; that is the friendship of pleasure.  Aristotle says that friends for pleasure love the other "like a witty person, not because of his character, but because he is pleasant to themselves" (Ethics 9.32). In this type of love we have the self as the object of love. For example, I love my friend because he likes to laugh with me and makes me laugh. This kind of relationship is based more upon feelings, "and they pursue above all what is pleasant for themselves and what is near at hand" (Ethics, 9.34). If, for example, the friend no longer brings me laughter, but maybe in patience, then the relationship ceases to be pleasant, and therefore the friendship may come to an end or just be place on hold until that which makes the relationship pleasant returns. This may help us explain most of the friendships we enjoy and why at times we may distance ourselves from certain friends at certain periods of our lives.

 

These two types of relationships are based on how much my friend does for me; not on how much I can do for my friend. Aquinas says, "Friendship based on convenience or pleasure is friendship inasmuch as we want our friend's good; but because this is subordinate to our own profit or pleasure, such friendship is subordinate to love of desire and falls short of true friendships" (cf. McDermott, p.205).

Aristotle would agree by saying that "such loves are coincidental, since the beloved is loved not insofar as he is who he is, but in so far as he provides some good or pleasure" (Ethics, 9.32). Since feelings are more spontaneous, it appears that these relationships are rooted on spontaneous reactions towards a temporary good which is presented to us. This type of relationship dominates our society. For example, if one feels like going for a movie, one may feel like going with a particular type of friend, that which may enjoy a movie with us. But such friendships may not move beyond that pleasant experience. Because our feelings are more or less spontaneous, so these types of friendship will enjoy more spontaneity. Without moral obligations or commitments, these friendships are pleasant, but they might not be able to challenge us to move towards a life of virtue. To grow in virtue one would need to move beyond what one feels like doing. Since spontaneity turns into a defense of freedom in regard to social rules, moral rules that limit freedom and threaten spontaneity will be attributed by those friendships thus share its artificial characters. Because freedom and feelings are the object of these friendships, and not the pursuance of virtue, which at times may challenge our feelings as right or wrong, these types of friendships, though might be good at some levels and therefore beneficial for us, they are not virtuous, since their object is not to find Virtue.

Friendship and Virtue

Then, when is it that a friendship is good and virtuous? That would be the friendship that Jesus himself practiced. He said to his disciples, "I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my father" (Jn. 15:15). Here we see that the object of friendship is not what a "slave" can do for his master; thus, it is not friendship of utility or pleasure. Rather, it is a love directed towards the disciples, for Jesus told them that, "No one has greater love than this, to lay down ones life for ones friend" (Jn 15:13). He proved this love when he laid his life on the Cross for his friends. Virtuous friendship are grounded on the same principle.  This is the third kind of friendship that Aristotle identifies. This virtuous friendship can be described by five characteristics.

 

In virtuous friendship the object of love is the other person, who is loved in and of himself. Thus, this love is of friendship (amor benevolentiae). This is the type of friendship that can bring us closer to our moral good, which is God. There are certain characteristics that help us identify the presence of a true and virtuous friend.

 

The Characteristics of Friends

Attraction

The first characteristic of friendship is that of an attraction. This characteristic belongs to the external realm of the relationship; As Aristotle said, "for friends seek one another and are not happy unless they are together."

 

However, when proximity is not possible, "the attraction manifests itself by the one's turning his thoughts and desires to the other" (Catholic Encyclopedia, 204). This kind of physical and spiritual interaction is best described by St. Augustine who believed that one of the effects of friendship was to "put one's soul in two bodies" (Confessions 4.6.11). Thus, friendship is spiritual as well as physical.

Affection 

The second characteristic follows the first one and is the friendship that involves affection. This characteristic involves the interior realm of the person. It is because a person loves his friend that he is attracted to him. Even though this is an interior principle of action, "it is occasionally discernible, sometimes by gestures, sometimes by smiles or even by tears" (Catholic Encyclopedia, 204).

Reciprocity 

The Third characteristic of friendship is that of reciprocal affection. It is only when the redamatio responds to the amatio that one can speak of true friendship (amicitia). A man may love wine, but wine cannot love a man. Aquinas argues that "friends are rational creatures, able to return our love and share our life, and able to be well and happy or the reverse, so that one wills properly their good" (cf. McDermott, 54). This reciprocity explains why a relationship grows deeper with each return of affection. This is a phenomenon of love provoking more love in ever-increasing proportions. Aquinas said that "friendship must be mutual (friends are friends with friends); [so that] a mutual good, will be built on what we have in common" (cf. McDermott, 349).

Spiritual and Intellectual Union

The fourth characteristic is a union of a spiritual nature. Friendship, as we have seen above, is peculiar to the spiritual and intellectual life, as Aristotle would say. Therefore, "its activity has certain independence from matter, and it provokes a spiritual union" (Catholic Encyclopedia, p. 204). Accordingly, union is based on the intellect, will, and feeling, wherefore it is properly human. This is the friendship par excellence "for in its case the friends seek each other for what they are rather than what they give" (Catholic Encyclopedia, 203). Contrary to the friendships of utility and pleasure, virtuous friendship is naturally lasting, because it is built on moral goods, the real good of an intelligent being. Hence, the book of Sirach maintains, "A faithful friend is a life-saving remedy, such as he who fears God finds; for he who fears God acts accordingly and his friend would be like himself" (6:16-17). 

 

Seek Nothing but the Good

The fifth characteristic of friendship is that it is a disinterested type of relationship. It is not utilitarian and its love is for the friend's own sake. According to Aristotle, the virtuous friendship is complete in so far as the individuals "wish goods in the same way to each other in so far as they are good, and they are good in themselves" (Ethics, 9.35). Hence they wish goods to each other for each other's own sake. Farrell says that, "The friendship of virtue is that by which one desires good for another, and by which the cause of attraction is the virtue of the friends" (456). This type of friendship is truly good because it is unselfish and has the highest motives.

 

 A Friend is a Remedy to Mediocrity

To conclude, then, it is clear that we need virtuous friendships in order to grow in virtue. One becomes whatever one loves. And if we love a friend in virtue, we will love virtue in friendship. When friendships are established according to a rule of utility and pleasure the participants in such relationship will only get what they love. Accordingly, friends, in order to sustain a relationship by which they can see God, need to nourish a virtuous friendship by which they can identify the good in themselves, in each other, and finally in God. St. Gregory of Nazianzen reiterates these five characteristic of a virtuous friendship when he meditates on his intimate tie with St. Basil the Great. When they both moved to Athens to study, they found certain similarities on each other and. St. Gregory said of his friend:

 

We began to feel affection for each other. When, in the course of time, we acknowledged our friendship... we became everything to each other: we shared the same lodging, the same table, the same desires, the same goal. Our love for each other grew warmer and deeper... We seemed to be two bodies with a single spirit...each of us was in the other and with the other...our single object of ambition was virtue...With this end in view we ordered our lives and all our actions. We followed the guidance of God's law and spurred each other in virtue...we found in each other a standard and rule for discerning right from wrong" (From The Liturgy of the Hours, Vol. I, p. 1286.). 

St. Gregory and St. Basil are a great illustration of how good and holy friendships develop. Their great pursuit, as St. Gregory concludes, was the great name they wanted to share: "To be Christians, to be called Christians." This is the real reason for a good and virtuous friendship.

Bibliography

 

Aquinas, Thomas, St., Summa Theologiae; tran. Fathers of the       English Dominican Province; New York: Benziger Brothers,    1947.

          ---. Summa Theologiae: A Concise Translation; ed. Timothy McDermott; Westminster: Christian Classics, 1989.

Aristotle; Nicomachean Ethics, tran. Terence Irwin; Indianapolis:   Hacket, 1985.

Farrell, Walter.

Liturgy of the Hours, The, Vol. 1; New York: Catholic Book, 1975.

New American Bible, Nashville: Catholic Press, 1986.

New Catholic Encyclopedia; s.v. "Friendship"; New York: McGrew         Hill, 1967.

Ortega y Gasset, José; Ensayos Escojidos, Ed. Pedro Lainenralgo. Madrid: Aguilar, 1957.

Pinckaers, Servais, O.P., The Source of Christian Ethics; tran.        Sr. Mary Thomas Noble, O.P.; Washington: The Catholic       University of America, 1995.

Wadell, Paul J.,Friendship and the Moral Life; Notre Dame: University Press, 1989.