(The Nationalist, 6 April 2001)
An expert is someone who can make a difficult job look easy. In the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris there is a stained-glass window which shows a donkey trying to play a harp. He has put his foot through the strings and broken them, and is shown looking at the broken harp with a blank expression on its face, as if to say, ‘What went wrong?’ The donkey was no expert at playing the harp.
Some years ago I visited a glass factory where a skilled craftsman blew a blob of molten glass on the end of a steel tube into various sizes and thicknesses. Then he used a knife to shape it into a bottle, a vase, a dish or whatever he wanted. He made the job look so simple you’d think anyone could do it. He then invited some of the visitors to try their hand at it. One man decided to give it a go. He put the tube to his lips and blew hard. The blob of molten glass simply fell off the end of the tube. That illustrated the difference between the expert and the amateur.
I remember a young Irishwoman whom I knew in Africa. She had spent seventeen years of her life there, living and working with the people, mostly women, in a rural area. Among other things she had successfully pioneered the growing of rice, and it came to provide a useful cash crop for farmers who otherwise lived at a subsistence level.
But she was an expert in another way. She made heroic goodness seem easy; she made it look natural, obvious and effortless. But the truth is, of course, that there are few things more demanding than kindness. She was, you could say, an expert in kindness. In other words, she was a saint.
She was a person with both feet firmly on the ground, practical and down-to-earth, someone who could stick up for herself – no doormat – and who had courage and strength of character. When you spoke to her you had the feeling of being in touch with a real person, someone who was true to herself. What you saw was what you got – someone who was authentic and integral.
The English Catholic writer, G. K. Chesterton, said something to the effect that nothing is as rare as “common” sense. You could add that nothing is as rare as “ordinary” goodness. You recognize it when you meet it; you know it as the real thing. It is easier to admire than to imitate. But it has about it the ring of genuineness and authenticity.