Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Love Is Not Feelings

Mark P. Shea
06/21/2011

Excerpt:
That choice to love may be easy sometimes. “Falling in love” (that divine madness) is, like all our loves, a little image of the Great Love who is God. But no earthly relationship between lovers has ever consisted simply and solely of the spark called “falling in love” lasting forever, any more than a fire in a fireplace consists simply and solely of an endless repetition of the spark that starts it. Fire requires more than sparks: It requires fuel and the work of feeding the fire, giving it oxygen, and tending it, lest it burn out or smother. The wood of every earthly love, friendship, or family relationship is the patient gift of ourselves in small ways every day. The oxygen is the unconditional agape love of God, the breath of the Holy Spirit, who we ask to breathe on our attempts at love and charity and who graciously does so.

Thousands of little gifts of self — little prayers of forgiveness, little acts of thanksgiving, little acts of service, small compliments, daily verbal reminders of “I love you,” minor gifts and kindnesses, taking out the garbage, making dinner, putting down the seat on the toilet, noticing the gas tank is getting low and refilling it, brief caresses, listening even when you were in the middle of a good book or TV show: All these add up like tiny grains of sand over time and form one of the most powerful things in all of human history: habits. And habits of charity, over time, can affect not just your life but those of people around you as they “catch” your habits, the way we catch each other’s colds. In short, when we act out our love in obedience to the command to love, we find that our feelings follow more and more. More than that, we find that whatever our feelings do, we are not controlled by them anymore, because we find that we are freed by the Spirit to act in love whatever our feelings may be.

This is, by the way, one of the reasons our worship is liturgical and not based on feelings. We “go through the motions” as Christ offers Himself to the Father in the Eucharist — not because the Mass is “empty ritual,” but because it is full and we are empty. We join in with Jesus’ self-offering and are not told to “take, feel” but “take, eat.” We may or may not feel something, but as long as we obey the command to eat, we are pleasing to God — because we obey Him.

Of course, that’s not the only obedience He requires, but it is the model of our lives as disciples. If we love Him, we obey Him as He obeys the Father in offering Himself and receiving His life back from the Father. If we don’t feel good while obeying Him, that doesn’t mean we are acting wrongly. Indeed, as Christ Crucified made clear, sometimes obedience to and love of God does not feel good at all. But it remains the Way. Full essay here-don't miss this!
 image by Mike Baird

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