Based on the series Stranger Things, Harold La Cruz proposes a pastoral reflection on friendship as a refuge from loneliness, fear, and fragility. From an Augustinian and deeply human perspective, the text shows how authentic bonds sustain life, create space for hope, and become a place where God acts silently.
Friendship as a refuge in times of fragility
In a world marked by haste, loneliness, and the fear of showing oneself as fragile, authentic friendship becomes a refuge where life finds meaning again.
The series Stranger Things has resonated with millions of people because it touches on a deeply human experience. Beyond its aesthetics or its fantastic elements, its story is based on an essential value: friendship. It does not appear as a simple narrative resource, but as the force that allows one to cross the darkness, face fears, and not give up when everything seems lost.
Throughout the series, the protagonists discover that no one is saved alone. External threats are real, but the most decisive battles are fought within. Fear, insecurity, and personal wounds can only be faced when walking alongside others who support, listen, and remain.
This experience is not foreign to daily life. True friendships, those that are built over time and strengthened in trust, have the ability to overcome stages, changes, and crises. When joys are shared, they multiply. When difficulties are experienced together, they are alleviated. Not because they disappear, but because they cease to be a solitary burden.
Friendship from an Augustinian perspective
From a pastoral and Augustinian perspective, friendship is not something superficial. Saint Augustine deeply understood its value from his own life experience. He discovered that friendship is only full when it is inhabited by God, and he expressed it clearly: “There can be no true friendship except between those whom you unite, Lord.” For him, friendship was a space where the heart learns to love, to listen, and to seek the truth together.
In Stranger Things, the bonds evolve. They do not remain anchored in a naive childhood, but mature, become strained, and are tested. This also happens in real life. Authentic friendship does not avoid conflict or pain, but teaches how to get through them without breaking communion. It grows when it is accepted that the other changes, when one learns to forgive, and when one chooses to remain.
Many young people today recognize this experience in their own groups, communities, or significant friendships. When safe bonds exist, one learns to trust, to express what hurts, and to walk without masks. Strength is not born from appearing secure, but from daring to be vulnerable to those who truly love.
Friendship as a place where God acts
Saint Augustine lucidly recalled that the human heart is restless until it rests in God. However, that rest is often experienced through concrete relationships that care, accompany, and sustain. Friendship thus becomes a place where God acts silently, healing wounds and strengthening hope.
For believers and spiritual seekers, this message is especially relevant today. We live in a culture that exalts self-sufficiency and individual success, but experience shows that no one truly grows without solid bonds. Faith itself is lived in communion. The Church is, in its essence, a walking together where one learns to support each other and to wait.
Jesus himself expressed it with a disarming closeness when he said to his disciples: “I no longer call you servants… but I have called you friends” (Jn 15:15). In that friendship offered by Christ, all true friendship is founded, capable of overcoming fear and opening paths to new life.
In times of uncertainty and fragility, caring for friendship is an urgent pastoral task. Opening oneself to the other, allowing oneself to be accompanied, and accompanying with fidelity not only helps to overcome fears, but becomes a concrete way of living the Gospel today. Where there is authentic friendship, hope finds a home and life flourishes again.
