Catholic friends of Jesus?

I saw a post today that generated a lot of comments about "Evangelical Catholicism" and George Weigel's idea of it as being in part about a "friendship with Jesus".

Some who commented thought the idea of friendship with Jesus was just incoherent since Jesus is impassibly God, oh, and dead ;), some cringed at the very word "Jesus" and would only use his job description, some thought the idea was too Protestant and that the sacraments were all that mattered, some were ok with interior prayer but preferred centering prayer rather than prayer styles that fostered a relationship with God, and some did like the "friendship with Jesus" idea that Ignatian spirituality seems to support.

I think it was the first time I'd seen Catholics discuss their individual/personal prayer lives. Uncharacteristically, my comments seemed almost Pollyannaishly optimistic compared to some that reflected worries about what Jesus/God was like. Sigh - it doesn't seem like all this stuff should be so hard.