Why are we here? I would contend that we are here to love.
But, what exactly is love?
Each of us yearns to love and be loved, but what exactly is this thing we all call love? I find the English language a bit lacking here as other languages have many different words for love. This is true in the Greek and Hebrew texts of the Bible (many words for love).
When one thinks of love, an initial inclination may be to think of a couple who is lost in passion for each other and blind to reality. Or, one may think of a parent doing their teenager's laundry after being called an idiot. Yes, these are both examples of love.
There are many examples of "true love" out there and we don't often reflect on them.
Let us consider a few.
I think one of the biggest examples of love was when the firefighters, police officers, and others went into the World Trade Center and gave their lives in the hope of saving those still in the buildings. It is amazing how much "true love" flows in the midst of the biggest evils.
Other examples are those soldiers who paid the ultimate price. Those true heroes who jumped on grenades or took bullets for the "team" and really for all of us. These people had "true love.".
Consider the couple who had that initial passionate love and then had it apparently weaken. They have troubles but stay together and survive for 50-60 years. In their old age, they bear the wounds of many struggles and physical ailments. They have a deep concern for each other that is hard to put into words. This is also true love. Some of these couples wind up ministering to each other through cancer and other illnesses, right up to death.
Then, we have simpler and not so profound examples of true love that we see everyday.
The people raising money to help so many causes from MS through Cancer Cures and more.
When we watch football and other sports, we occasionally see John 3:16. It is a beautiful verse but I love 1 John 4:16 even more and here it is in one translation:
We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us. God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him.
Christians are all about love. The Catholic Church is all about this love and the newest leader, Benedict XVI, put his focus on love with his first major writing, "God is love." In this book, he addresses different kinds of love including agape and eros and ties them together.
More later. What examples of love have you had in your life?
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Thanks Jim: I posted a reply but I'm not sure if it went through (asked me for an account).
My reply was around how complicated 'love' and 'true love' are as it entails many meanings.
A few examples to think about:
Does love need to be returned in order to be legitimate? In other words I can say "I'm in love with Miss American, but would she even know who I am. Can a person be in love with food, their employer, their home or some other inanimate thing? You hear this all the time "I love pizza". "I love my cottage".
So is love therefore a mutual agreement between two or more people that requires nurturing and change thought-out the relationship in order to qualify as love? Does is require a level of commitment and respect that demonstrates the participants to be serious about their relationship and expressive as such - and more importantly does it need to be on an equal (or compatible) footing?
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Juan