Love Has Labels

It's been awhile since I posted any of my Youth Group talks. What follows is a rough transcript of it.

If you ever seen the ad campaign ‘Love has No Label’ put out by the Ad Council about diversity and inclusion, I’m here to tell you that is completely wrong.

It has three.

English is a beautiful expressive language that unfortunately our modern lazy usage has heap multiple meanings into one word as is the case with ‘love’.

Book cover of encyclical

Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI (who just had his 90^th birthday) described love best in his encyclical, Deus Cartias Est (God is Love). A awe-inspiring title when you really think about it – God is Love. So, to explain the three labels of love Greek, one of the languages of the Bible, is used.

We have philia: this is a mutual love between friends. So when I tell Lauren and Natalie (note: these lovely ladies work with the youth group)  I love them, which I do, it is philia love.

Next, we have eros: this it is an ascending, possessive love which seeks to receive from another. This is a physical love, or a physical manifestation of love, expressed between husband and wife.

Then we have agape: this is a descending love, oblative love in which one gives oneself to another. This is a selfless love seeking out what is good for another for the sake of the other.

If eros and philia love are concerned primarily with our relationships with others than agape is concerned primarily with our relationship with God as well as each other’s relationship with God. Think about it – in the Greek translation of the New Testament agape is the most often used word for love. This reflects the distinctive aspect of Christian understanding of love. Agape is, essentially, Christian love, which should be shared with everyone no matter how we feel - love isn't just about feelings. God commanded us to love our neighbors and enemies, not to like them.

Agape requires truth to be able to express it. We must know what is right and wrong, what is good, and what is bad for us as humans. Without truth, love becomes nothing more than mere sentiment – it is empty/ no substance. It becomes distorted because it no longer bears any weight.

The hardest part about agape is that it requires us to correct our neighbor when they stumble. We have a great example of this from the Bible in Galatians where St Paul corrects St Peter when he is behaving badly. There is also St Catherine of Siena who went to Pope Gregory XI and said that the Papacy must return to Rome (the popes had been living in Avignon, France – the pope must live in Rome because he is the Bishop of Rome). Can you imagine going to the Pope and telling him - 'Hey you got to straighten up your act'? I be terrified! These actions of St. Paul and St. Catherine are not done out of malice but because both St Paul and St Catherine wanted St Peter and Pope Gregory to be better people. It’s the same as when our parents correct us, they want us to be better.

Agape, Christian love, must be placed be placed above philia and eros, even when people hate us for it.

I will end with a quote from P. Benedict from another of his encyclicals Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth) : “To love someone is to desire that persons good and to take effective steps to secure it.”

On a fun note, when ever I had to say agape, I pointed to the youth director, Lauren, who would say it like Dory in Finding Nemo would say 'escape'. The kids love it and it was a good youth meeting!

What's Happened to Love?

I fully admit that I read young adult novels.  It's a habit I develop in school when I wanted something light and easy after reading dense philosophy and theology texts. A nice reprieve.  One main reason I veered towards the young adult novels is that I know that there will not be a sex scene, maybe intense awkward kissing but no sex.

So with the desire to vegging out I began reading The Selection by Kiera Cass.  Best way I can describe the book without getting into too much detail is that it's a water down version of the Hunger Games meets the teen version of The Bachelor/ette.  Overall the story was meh.  It had the overused trope of love triangle with a all talk don't see a lot of action war going on in the background.  Again me reading this series was solely for the purpose of vegging out.  It worked all the way up to the last few chapters of the third and, thankfully, last book when the main girl and the prince start stripping off each other's clothes.

Let me repeat that - stripping off each other's clothes!!!!

My brain crashed in on itself when I first read the passage.  Fortunately they stop when they reach the last layer of underclothing because they didn't want to get caught.  This point in the story they just declared their love for each other and are unmarried.

I quickly finished the book just to know what happened. It was predictable with unnecessary angst and way too many side characters killed off for dramatic effect.  I guess the author was going for a 'earn your happy ending' trope.

It is an unfortunate trend I see with anything about love directed at the tween to young adult audience.  Love has become less about wanting the best for the other (ultimately getting that person to Heaven) and more about physical gratification.  There are common placed, and getting overused descriptions of 'eyes clouded with want', 'a need that they could not explain', 'quickening pace of the heart' all used to describe what true love is like.  Having never been in love, I do not know what it is like, but I do know what is expected of people when they are in love (many thanks to parental units and married sibling).

Love in it's truest form is selfless, wanting what is best for the other.  You can get mad at your spouse, fight, give the silent treatment, disagree, or keep secrets, because lets face the facts we're human we made more mistakes then we would care admit to anyone.  In the marriage vows it states that you will be by your spouse's side for better or worse, not just when you are happy.  There is no such thing as 'Happily ever after' because being in love takes effort, work, and determination. We live within the passing of time, never just in a moment.  We remember and relish the happy moments, we try to ignore the bad, but we cannot stay.

As I rant about love another book comes to mind: Arms of Love by Carmen Marcoux.  In this novel a young couple work on having a chaste courtship/relationship and everyone, outside of the girl's family and friends, sees their actions as something defective.  I read this one several years ago when I was still in college. While I applaud the efforts of Mrs. Marcoux to present love authentically, I really cannot recommend the book. I really did want to enjoy the book, and on Amazon there are many positive reviews, but in the end it felt fake.  It was more of a sermon with a thin plot rather than a story with a moving message.  I doubt many secular or non-Catholics would even consider reading it. For me the Catholicism in the book felt ... too touchy-feely for me. But I'm a smells and bells kinda girl.

I have witness relationships that seemed to have stepped out of pages of 'Arms of Love' and they have the strange aftertaste of spurious and induce fear for any children they may have. DO NOT misunderstand me, chastity (both mind and spirit) rocks in my humble opinion.  But something does not ring right when a couple waits til they exchange their vows for their first kiss.  An act such as that has a gnostic feel to it, like the couple is saying they are better than the rest because they rise above the physical acts of affection (kissing, hugging, holding hands).

Take the book as you will. I'm not going to force you to read it.

With the recent release of '50 Shades of Gray', a pornographic fanfic turned book turned box office record breaking movie I feel that we as a society has lost touch on what love actually is.  Love is expressed in so many muddy confusing ways that in the ends leaves many wanting more, thus looking for that something more in all the wrong places and end up hurt.

St. Raphael the Archangel, Patron of Love and Lovers, Ora Pro Nobis.