mere mortals?

I was reading the other day at my favorite coffee shop (the shop with the biggest pastries!...and some pretty good coffee) and was just smacked upside the face with this passage from C.S. Lewis. As odd as it my be this is my first Lewis, so...sorry if i'm just way behind. Something my pastor said tonight reminded me of this. It comes from the last page of the first chapter of The Weight of Glory:

"There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations- these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit- immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean we are perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously- no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner - no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to you senses."

And a few quotes from Pastor Krist:

"Love is inconvenient."

"What would happen if the Church started doing something creative with the Golden Rule?"

I used to be better at this neighbor loving stuff. And by neighbor i mean the people around me at any given point. When i was a kid i loved people. In elementary school i used to talk to everyone, "be nice" to everyone. What happened? Well somewhere along the line I started caring what was cool, what I looked like, what other people looked like, what other people could get me...and I lost some of that innocence. I want it back! I want to see people as glorious, precious creations. Lord, help me.