Thursday, December 07, 2006
True love
On reflecting a little on yesterday's post, I felt that I was a little off-hand about a particular phrase: "true love". It's a little too romanticised a phrase, and I wasn't sure it was very well chosen. I didn't mean it to be twee, honestly. Maybe, for true, we should substitue "God-given". That certainly reads better, and it better expresses what I meant. I think that any love which _is_ truly love ("true love", therefore) is God-given. That's one of the problems that we have when we talk about sin within loving relationships. If the relationships are truly God-given, how can their expression be sinful?
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Interesting reflection there Mike- I suspect we cheapen a lot of words but in this case both suffer- true becomes empty and love pink and frilly- time for some reclaiming of language I suspect.
Sally
Sally
Fallen humanity is perfectly capable of mis-using any of God's gifts, including loving relationships.
It has been argued (by one of the Eastern Fathers, I forget whom) that God must exist in three persons rather than two, because we see in human relationsips that 'love' between two people can be selfish, excluding and self-indulgent. Real 'love' requires a third subject/object.
In human relationships duties to god and society can be put to one side in the intensity of our emotions. Unless God is allowed fully into the relationship as a participant - not just as a founder - it is not 'true love'
It has been argued (by one of the Eastern Fathers, I forget whom) that God must exist in three persons rather than two, because we see in human relationsips that 'love' between two people can be selfish, excluding and self-indulgent. Real 'love' requires a third subject/object.
In human relationships duties to god and society can be put to one side in the intensity of our emotions. Unless God is allowed fully into the relationship as a participant - not just as a founder - it is not 'true love'
In which case Simon- would you suggest that the very act of making love exclusive in the sense that God is kept out of the picture is a sin?
I 'm not talking about the exclusivity of a sexual relationship in marriage but rather the scenario that two people become so wrapped up in one another they cannot be open to either God or anyone else.
When God is in the picture then true love welcomes and invites others in.
I 'm not talking about the exclusivity of a sexual relationship in marriage but rather the scenario that two people become so wrapped up in one another they cannot be open to either God or anyone else.
When God is in the picture then true love welcomes and invites others in.
Sorry, catching up here a bit...
Surely the act of love-making actually involves all sorts of other people? Like potential children; actual children who depend upon the maintenance of a relationship? The two families that may (or may not) have been brought together in a marriage? The two respective sets of friends brought together by the two who are in a loving relationship? Or those who are hurt by the relationship.
And - as Simon says - God as well. Since the act of love is a kind of sacrament - a visible sign of invisible grace.
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Surely the act of love-making actually involves all sorts of other people? Like potential children; actual children who depend upon the maintenance of a relationship? The two families that may (or may not) have been brought together in a marriage? The two respective sets of friends brought together by the two who are in a loving relationship? Or those who are hurt by the relationship.
And - as Simon says - God as well. Since the act of love is a kind of sacrament - a visible sign of invisible grace.
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