Love, Value & Identity ~ Part I

One of my favorite places in Nashville is the Main Branch Library, downtown on 7th and Church. After dining outside on a recent, windy, Sunday afternoon, I stepped into the calm warmth of the library to 'find what I could find.' I had no plan except for the possibility of finding something I've never read before by C.S. Lewis (I recently finished re-reading The Four Loves). I stepped up to the catalog and wrote down a few call numbers, happy to find that one such number- 230.2- was right in front of me. What better place to start than right there! As I perused each book, each work, each colorful binder, I decided to pass on The Joyful Christian and slid from the shelf a book whose title and author both gleamed at me-- Love and Living, by Thomas Merton. I searched a few of the pages and stumbled upon this passage:

"Our conception of ourselves is bound to be profoundly affected by our conception- and our experience- of love. And our love, or our lack of it, our willingness to risk it or our determination to avoid it, will in the end be an expression of ourselves: of who we think we are, of what we want to be, of what we think we are here for."
~Thomas Merton, Love and Living


I've been through all four of these stages and am only now compelled- or perhaps able- to clearly define them and who I've learned I am because of them. Here, I'll begin with the last and briefly share them in reverse order.

In my mid-twenties I was determined to avoid love. It was the most selfish time of my life. I had no real desire to have children, nor felt the need to ever get married. Admittedly, it was wonderful, and I was carefree. I thought love was an obligation to those who chose it, and I, in my independence, had no desire to be attached to such a thing. But my heart changed forever about a month before my 25th birthday; my first niece was born. A love unlike any other affection I'd ever felt for my family or friends, and completely unlike Eros, led me to (if I may borrow an image from the Psalms) "the rock that is higher than I." This love was profound. This love swelled and breathed. This love made me think of something greater than myself. This love meant that Love is inevitable.

My willingness to risk love is trickier to define. I suppose hospitality is a risk. I've discovered that you learn who you are when you give of yourself because you learn what you are capable of, or not, your strengths as well as your weaknesses. It may energize me to express hospitality, to give joyfully- without expectation from another- but even I get worn out when I'm risking my heart only to receive little or nothing in return. The risk of love, largely, is not knowing whether you will be loved in return, or especially equally so. And there will always come a point when you have to decide whether or not risking it will be worth it.

To lack love, in particular areas, is something most of us seem to know all too well, and this, in our human view, is where we put too much emphasis on our identity. I know the pain of years lived without true intimacy. I know loneliness. I know how crippling it feels to fight, and fail, and fight some more against the lies that I'm not loved, or not loved well-enough, and that therefore I must be unlovable. God (who is Love Himself) knows love is necessary and important to our well-being-- so important, that when asked what the Lord's will is, He answers, "To look after orphans and widows." The second greatest commandment is "to love your neighbor." Because we are all in need of love, love must be shared. Love must fill us up.

Our love. The love we have, the love we give, the ways in which we are loved. These tell us the greatest truths about ourselves. Whether we realize it or not we are always seeking love. Our souls require it and demand it for our healing, our health, and our happiness. Too often we are confused into thinking we require approval when what we truly need is an acceptance that is so unconditional that we succumb not to the darkness which has crept into our being but that we raise up to the light that has always been there. We already have value. Accepting and being accepted in this way gives us the strength to believe in our own value as well as the value of the other person. Love is strongest in it's each-otherness.