Catholic Commentary
Wise and Gracious Conduct Toward Outsiders
5Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time.6Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.
Colossians 4:5–6 calls Christians to conduct themselves with wisdom and grace in interactions with non-believers, treating each conversation as an opportune moment to be spiritually leveraged. Speech should be gracious yet incisive, individually adapted to the listener, reflecting divine generosity while maintaining truth-bearing clarity.
Christian witness lives in the gap between grace and salt—tenderness sharp enough to actually change minds, not comfort that puts people to sleep.
The image of salt (halas) is polyvalent and rich. In the ancient world salt served as a preservative, a flavoring, a covenantal symbol (Lev 2:13; Num 18:19), and a mark of wit and incisiveness — classical rhetoricians used "salty" (sal) to describe sharp, memorable, penetrating speech. Paul fuses all of these: Christian speech should be preserving (protecting truth), flavorful (genuinely engaging rather than bland or pious-sounding), covenantally marked (belonging to the household of God), and pointed (capable of actually getting somewhere in conversation). Origen noted that salt without grace would be biting and harsh, while grace without salt would be insipid and ineffectual — the two must work together.
The purpose clause, "that you may know how you ought to answer each one" (heni hekastō), shifts from the quality of speech to its fit — its correspondence to the particular person being addressed. This is a form of what Catholic tradition calls prudential judgment applied to evangelization: the same truth must be delivered differently to a grieving widow, a hostile philosopher, a curious young person, or a lapsed Catholic. The singular heni hekastō ("to each one") forbids the mass-produced, one-size-fits-all approach to witness. Wisdom, grace, salt, and attentiveness to the individual person are the integrated virtues of the missionary disciple.
Catholic tradition brings several layers of illumination to these verses that other readings can overlook.
The Incarnational Logic of Witness. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that "the witness of a Christian life is the first and irreplaceable form of mission" (CCC §2044; cf. Ad Gentes §11). Paul's language of "walking" and "answering" makes clear that evangelization is embodied before it is verbal — posture precedes proclamation. This reflects the Incarnation itself: the eternal Word became flesh before he spoke the Sermon on the Mount.
Salt as Baptismal Identity. The ancient Rite of Baptism included the placing of a grain of salt on the catechumen's tongue, symbolizing wisdom, preservation from corruption, and the savor of divine truth (still retained in the Extraordinary Form). Paul's "salt" metaphor thus has a sacramental resonance for Catholic readers: the baptized are constitutively "salty" people, and their speech must embody this identity.
Prudence and the New Evangelization. St. John Paul II's Redemptoris Missio (§44) calls for sensitivity to the person being evangelized — "respectful dialogue" that honors the other's conscience and dignity. This is precisely what Paul envisions in "answering each one." It is not relativism but the virtue of prudence (phronesis), which St. Thomas Aquinas identifies as the virtue that applies right reason to particular acts (ST II-II, q. 47). The New Evangelization is not simply a matter of louder proclamation but wiser, saltier, more personally attentive engagement.
The Patristic Tradition on Christian Speech. St. Ambrose, in De Officiis (I.10), draws on this verse to argue that the Christian's conversation should have the quality of the "salt of wisdom," distinguishing holy speech from both empty flattery and needless severity. The Council of Trent's decree on preaching (Session V) likewise insists that the proclamation of the Word be adapted to the capacity and condition of the hearers — a magisterial echo of Paul's heni hekastō.
Contemporary Catholics inhabit a culture that is simultaneously hyper-connected and deeply suspicious of religious speech. Social media has made it easy to broadcast and hard to converse. Paul's two-verse program cuts directly against the grain of our moment.
"Redeeming the time" challenges the Catholic who is waiting for some ideal moment — a retreat, a formal inquiry class, a crisis — to share faith with a colleague, neighbor, or adult child who has drifted from the Church. The kairos is now, in the lunch conversation, in the comment offered after the funeral, in the question answered when a coworker asks why you don't seem anxious.
"Seasoned with salt" is a rebuke to two common Catholic failure modes: the saccharine, jargon-heavy piety that sounds pleasant but says nothing, and the combative, politically weaponized speech that is "salty" without grace. The integration Paul demands — gracious and pointed, warm and truthful — requires real formation, ongoing examination of conscience about how we actually speak, and the humility to learn what this particular person needs to hear. Practically: before engaging someone outside the faith, pray briefly for wisdom about them specifically, not just for courage to speak.
Commentary
Colossians 4:5 — "Walk in wisdom toward those who are outside, redeeming the time."
The imperative peripateite ("walk") is Paul's characteristic word for the whole shape of the Christian moral life (cf. Col 1:10; 2:6; 3:7). It evokes not a single act but a sustained, habitual pattern of conduct — life as a journey undertaken with intention. The qualifying phrase "toward those who are outside" (pros tous exō) is significant: Paul uses hoi exō consistently for non-believers (cf. 1 Cor 5:12–13; 1 Thess 4:12), not as a term of contempt but as an honest acknowledgment that Christians occupy a distinct covenantal space. The call to wisdom (sophia) here is not merely prudential cleverness but the God-given, Spirit-illumined discernment celebrated in Col 1:9 and 2:3, where all wisdom and knowledge are said to be hidden in Christ. To walk wisely toward outsiders is therefore a christological act — to embody, in one's dealings with those who do not yet know Christ, the very wisdom that is Christ himself (1 Cor 1:24).
"Redeeming the time" (ton kairon exagorazomenoi) is a vivid commercial metaphor: exagorazō means to buy up, to purchase out of the marketplace entirely. The word kairos denotes not merely chronological time (chronos) but a charged, opportune moment — a season ripe with possibility. Paul's urgency here echoes Eph 5:16, where the same phrase is accompanied by the reason "because the days are evil." Every encounter with an unbeliever is a kairos, a moment of potential grace, and the Christian who sleeps through it or squanders it by foolish conduct has failed to act wisely. The Fathers were alert to this: St. John Chrysostom, commenting on this verse, urged that the Christian's life should be so ordered that no encounter with a pagan is wasted — the very sight of a Christian's behavior can be a form of proclamation.
Colossians 4:6 — "Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one."
"Always" (pantote) marks the totalizing scope of Paul's vision: not only in formal proclamation but in every casual exchange, speech must be characterized by charis — grace. In Pauline usage charis carries the freight of God's own generosity and favor; speech that is gracious is speech that participates in and communicates divine benevolence. It is attractive, life-giving, and free from bitterness or harshness.