Friends

When I think of the term friend or friendship I often think "what is a friend"

I strongly believe that a person can have many different kinds of friends. There are the friends we grew up with and went to school with. These friends have been in our lives from a young age.

Then there are the friends whom we get on with real well and we feel comfortable to confide in about the sensitive, private things. we may not know these friends as long as those whom we grew up with but since they entered our life they have been good to us and we have that trust between us where we can confide in each other about anything. A person who confides in a friend but that friend feels unable to confide in them as much because that person always seems to be going on about themselves to me is not a real friendship. A person should always feel that they can call on their friends when they are in need. Another sign of true friendship in my opinion is the friend who comes to the funeral of someone dear to you and attends regardless of their own religious beliefs, they go to show support to a friend.

Then we have our local priest/pastor/clergy person. This category includes religious brothers and those studying for the priesthood. We may get on really well with him or her but that friendship should be a lot different to that of a close friend. They are there to support you as best they can from a religious perspective. If they are really good at what they do they do they might also support you from a pastoral perspective as well as a religious one. Not all religious are able to do this so it can be good to clarify this for yourself early on in the friendship. They will generally know more about us than we know about them, this helps to keep the boundaries ensuring the friendship does not become too close as religious are often moved from place to place. We may know someone before they enter religious life, this friendship is different as they were a friend before they became religious.

There is the college friend who you don't really talk to or hang out with but you see during lectures and might bounce collrge/assignment ideas off from time to time and vis a versa.  But once you are finished in college that friendship declines to that of a simple "Facebook friendship"

When I think of modern technology and the likes of social media I have to mention "Facebook friends." I have many friends on Facebook, I have met the majority of them at least once, maybe I went to school with them and lost contact r maybe I met them at a retreat once. But then there are a few "Facebook friends" who I have never met or spoken to in my life. Maybe they are a friend of a friend r are friends on Facebook because of the work they do r because we live in the same area. Some of these friendships are very beneficial and I have met a few friends after becoming friends with them on Facebook.

And then there are the "unique" friends who don't fall into any category because of the kinda person they are, they wear many hsts (some literally)

So now that's my two pence on friends and friendship, now everyone knows that when I use the term friend or friendship that not everyone doesn't fall under the same umbrella. Hopefully by reading this those who are still in doubt as to what kind of friend i see them as will actually ask for clarification rather than jumping to the wrong conclusion. Oh and while I'm at it, you can care for someone else simply as one of the above friends and that's it.