A Pops Fernandez Article . .
from The
Philippine Star 
(Only in the printed
version)
" Unconditional Love "
We love people in different ways.
Some as friends, some as lovers,
some as family. But when these people change in a way we don't expect
them to, why does our love for them change, too?
It is because change is something hard to do, and perhaps harder still
to accept. We all hope that people around us change for the better but
they don't necessarily do and we are often not ready for that kind of
change, thus we hold back our affection.
We sometimes put people in a box, pigeon-hole them and label them the way
we want them to be. Thus, when they try to come out of the box, and do
something on their own our emotional equilibrium is put to a test.
An example is when a person we think is just a friend suddenly turns romantic
towards us. Don't we find ourselves- and the friendship- suddenly changing?
Or when a family member or a close friend something bad, not even to us,
but to another person, don't we change on how we treat that person?
The way we look at a person should not change. Whatever changes he goes
through, we should learn how to trust and respect him for the way he is.
There is always a reason for change. Try to accept and understand the
reasons he has for changing.
Remember the time we talked about being right or wrong in this column?
Nothing is right or wrong unless we have seen the consequence of the act.
Being right or wrong is always relative to the person involved in the
act itself.
Let us not judge a person for the changes he has made in his life. We are
all guilty of this, we judge people without trying to find out what the
truth really is. We judge people based on what we hear and what we see;
we don't even talk to the person involve. But what if it happened to us,
don't we hate it when people around us talk about us and judge us for
everything thing we do?
Trust that every act has a reason and a meaning. Before we think ill of
them, we should try to put ourselves in their shoes and find out how
it would feel if we were the person being judged and being talked about.
Let us do to another person what we exactly want done to us.
When we do so there will be less hurt, less gossip, less malice and less
judgment. And this will be a better world, the world that God dreamt
for everyone of us to live in.
_________________
PRAYER for UNDERSTANDING and LOVE
Lord, you have made us unique
in our different ways.
Let us understand the difference
in each one of us.
Let us acknowledge that we are here
for different reasons.
Help us understand and love
the people around us
the way we want to be understood and loved.
Let us not judge, so we will not be judged.
So we will all live in your love.
.