As good as your word

One of the earliest life lessons that has continued to mean the most to me is to be reliable and trustworthy when I open my mouth. Once my father promised to do something, I never doubted that it would happen. If there was ever any doubt in his mind that he would do something, he would hedge his promise in terms that would give him an out. And he would be sure to send out a warning as soon as it looked as if there might be a change of plans.

I have a friend, a holy man -- I will call him Vincent -- who has one trait I find infuriating. I can make arrangements to meet him a week in advance, and then not hear from him again until the minute we are scheduled to get together, when he calls to tell me that something else has come up. This is not uncommon. He is very popular, for good reason: he is clear-sighted, soothing and persuasive, and I appreciate that our social arrangements must get pushed aside when people in crisis call on him for healing or prayer.

When I tell him that it would help me live my own life if he would call with a change of plans soon after he knows about it, he tells me that other people's demands sometimes interfere with his focus. I disagree. In my father's mind, a commitment made for, say Thursday night, would tint his view of the future, so that anything else that threatened to fill the spot would set off a conflict mechanism, resulting in an immediate call that there had been a change of plans. No waiting for the last minute, no host waiting with a fine meal prepared in anticipation, no need for people to sit alone when they thought they were going to spend the evening with Vincent.

People excuse him for breaking appointments because he sometimes has to respond to unexpected demands. For my part, I forgive him but do not excuse him. Different standards may apply to etiquette and sin, but that doesn't make it any easier to accept this flaw in the armor of his holiness. I have tried to tell Vincent that I consider it unholy to set people up for disappointment by breaking his word, but it does not seem to matter to him.

Vincent may sometimes be as exasperated with me as I am with him. I do not embrace some of his values just as he is reckless about keeping his word. But it takes all kinds, and he obviously had a different father.