On helping one another (from His Suffering and Ours )
It’s almost universally true that the eye we turn toward ourselves is blind or obscured in some way, or the information we allow to reach it is filtered through our needs, our fears, our misconceptions. We cannot see the forest for the trees, must be reminded to remove the beam from our own eye before removing the speck in our neighbor’s, have adaged the imperative, “Know thyself.” Because we don’t.
If this is characteristic of our nature, it must be part of Your plan – even if it is only part of our fallen nature, as our fallenness is part of Your plan too! We do not really know ourselves wholly. Beyond that, we cannot judge ourselves (“neither do I judge my own self…but I am not thereby justified…” 1 Cor 4:3-4), and we cannot trust our own counsel (“…lean not on your own prudence… Be not wise in your own conceit” Prov 3:5). Why?
Because it is not Your will that we are completely self-sufficient. We are here for each other – to give to one another and to receive from one another. This is Your way in this world: to use us as instruments of Your love and truth. You reach through us to others, and through others to us; what we don’t always realize is that when we reach toward others, it is You we are seeking, and others are seeking You when they reach toward us. We are Your heart and Your hands in the world.
Of course, the clearer our connection with You is, the better conduits we are – we are channels of grace in proportion to how well we are in touch with the Source. But You use every good heart, even those with weak connections, because You are “ingenious to save.” You can use everything, everyone.
We are born needy and remain needy in many ways. We are physically born into a family of others, reborn into Your family (the Church) at Baptism, and destined for eternal communion. We are never solitary – even if we choose physical solitude, we remain part of a community of interdependence. There is no time or place at any point of our existence that we are ever really alone, and those who try to reject all communio are the most miserable souls alive. We are social beings, on every level.
We need each other physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. We cannot live, learn, laugh or love (those being the four corresponding actions to those four needs) if we are alone. We cannot fulfill our “eschatological vocation” on our own. We cannot be whole without other people. Still, why? Why are we always in need of guidance and support from outside of ourselves? Because mutual self-donation and mutual receptivity are the highest expression of our ontology. It IS what we ARE.
We are made to become gift. And this gift of self must be personal, even intimate. At a distance, we can rouse people, we can even impress them, but we cannot really impact them. We are changed by love, but we cannot love a crowd. Love is individual, personally affirming; it implies trust and vulnerability. We do not trust a crowd. A “group hug” is less effective than a handshake.
It’s a one-to-one interaction, a mutual trust, a generosity and selflessness, a willingness to reach out to a single soul, to put ourselves at risk or sacrifice our own wants for another that characterizes the communio personarum for which we’re made. And each interaction is unique and personal and (because it is touched by grace) sublime. We need each other to become our true selves.
Our difficulty with knowing ourselves (I say even our difficulty with becoming ourselves) and our inability to solve all our own problems insures that we keep reaching out to one another, inviting others to step beyond themselves for our sakes. You could have made us wiser, more self-sufficient, less interdependent. But our need for others maintains the law of mutual self-giving in spite of ourselves. We might otherwise convince ourselves that we are gods, that we need no one; worse, we might believe that no one needs us. But they do. We must take care of one another.
Our responsibility to one another in this aspect is great, so great that “he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law” (Rom 13:8)! How many times are we instructed to “love one another”?! It is our distinguishing characteristic – Your love in us and through us. Your insistence on this is so unwavering that we cannot live fully, cannot be whole, cannot know that we have such sublime potential unless we are loved. Unless our own goodness is revealed to us by another’s unconditional love, we cannot know ourselves at all.
There must be a relationship of trust (with even just one other person) in which we learn that we are lovable. We have to see it in their eyes, know that it is personal, know that it is a response to what we ARE, not what we do or provide, to learn that we are significant and good.
Then we are free to love in return. Then we are free to give ourselves fully for Your sake. You accept less than all of us, if it is all we are capable of giving, but a true civilization of love would free every soul to give itself utterly to another and to You because each person would know fully what they were giving! I can spend myself for others because I should, but I do so in a half-hearted way because I do not know myself, do not really know what I am capable of giving, and am not filled with love to give away because I am only half-capable of receiving love. But when I am loved by another, I learn Your love, learn how to be fully receptive to Your love, and am better equipped to give love in the form of self-donation.
Whole, we can give ourselves wholly.
So, others’ issues often seem clearer to us than our own, and we are perennially looking to others for support and affirmation. We are not self-sufficient because You want us to lean on one another, to learn Your own love for us. It is the way You have chosen to teach us that we are loved by Absolute Meaning, and that we possess intrinsic value as unique persons given the power to choose love of others over self.
Give us the grace to love as we should, to put others first and be freed to be loved in return.
“Since you have purified yourselves by obedience to the truth for sincere mutual love, love one another intensely from a pure heart.” -1 Peter
It’s almost universally true that the eye we turn toward ourselves is blind or obscured in some way, or the information we allow to reach it is filtered through our needs, our fears, our misconceptions. We cannot see the forest for the trees, must be reminded to remove the beam from our own eye before removing the speck in our neighbor’s, have adaged the imperative, “Know thyself.” Because we don’t.
If this is characteristic of our nature, it must be part of Your plan – even if it is only part of our fallen nature, as our fallenness is part of Your plan too! We do not really know ourselves wholly. Beyond that, we cannot judge ourselves (“neither do I judge my own self…but I am not thereby justified…” 1 Cor 4:3-4), and we cannot trust our own counsel (“…lean not on your own prudence… Be not wise in your own conceit” Prov 3:5). Why?
Because it is not Your will that we are completely self-sufficient. We are here for each other – to give to one another and to receive from one another. This is Your way in this world: to use us as instruments of Your love and truth. You reach through us to others, and through others to us; what we don’t always realize is that when we reach toward others, it is You we are seeking, and others are seeking You when they reach toward us. We are Your heart and Your hands in the world.
Of course, the clearer our connection with You is, the better conduits we are – we are channels of grace in proportion to how well we are in touch with the Source. But You use every good heart, even those with weak connections, because You are “ingenious to save.” You can use everything, everyone.
We are born needy and remain needy in many ways. We are physically born into a family of others, reborn into Your family (the Church) at Baptism, and destined for eternal communion. We are never solitary – even if we choose physical solitude, we remain part of a community of interdependence. There is no time or place at any point of our existence that we are ever really alone, and those who try to reject all communio are the most miserable souls alive. We are social beings, on every level.
We need each other physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. We cannot live, learn, laugh or love (those being the four corresponding actions to those four needs) if we are alone. We cannot fulfill our “eschatological vocation” on our own. We cannot be whole without other people. Still, why? Why are we always in need of guidance and support from outside of ourselves? Because mutual self-donation and mutual receptivity are the highest expression of our ontology. It IS what we ARE.
We are made to become gift. And this gift of self must be personal, even intimate. At a distance, we can rouse people, we can even impress them, but we cannot really impact them. We are changed by love, but we cannot love a crowd. Love is individual, personally affirming; it implies trust and vulnerability. We do not trust a crowd. A “group hug” is less effective than a handshake.
It’s a one-to-one interaction, a mutual trust, a generosity and selflessness, a willingness to reach out to a single soul, to put ourselves at risk or sacrifice our own wants for another that characterizes the communio personarum for which we’re made. And each interaction is unique and personal and (because it is touched by grace) sublime. We need each other to become our true selves.
Our difficulty with knowing ourselves (I say even our difficulty with becoming ourselves) and our inability to solve all our own problems insures that we keep reaching out to one another, inviting others to step beyond themselves for our sakes. You could have made us wiser, more self-sufficient, less interdependent. But our need for others maintains the law of mutual self-giving in spite of ourselves. We might otherwise convince ourselves that we are gods, that we need no one; worse, we might believe that no one needs us. But they do. We must take care of one another.
Our responsibility to one another in this aspect is great, so great that “he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law” (Rom 13:8)! How many times are we instructed to “love one another”?! It is our distinguishing characteristic – Your love in us and through us. Your insistence on this is so unwavering that we cannot live fully, cannot be whole, cannot know that we have such sublime potential unless we are loved. Unless our own goodness is revealed to us by another’s unconditional love, we cannot know ourselves at all.
There must be a relationship of trust (with even just one other person) in which we learn that we are lovable. We have to see it in their eyes, know that it is personal, know that it is a response to what we ARE, not what we do or provide, to learn that we are significant and good.
Then we are free to love in return. Then we are free to give ourselves fully for Your sake. You accept less than all of us, if it is all we are capable of giving, but a true civilization of love would free every soul to give itself utterly to another and to You because each person would know fully what they were giving! I can spend myself for others because I should, but I do so in a half-hearted way because I do not know myself, do not really know what I am capable of giving, and am not filled with love to give away because I am only half-capable of receiving love. But when I am loved by another, I learn Your love, learn how to be fully receptive to Your love, and am better equipped to give love in the form of self-donation.
Whole, we can give ourselves wholly.
So, others’ issues often seem clearer to us than our own, and we are perennially looking to others for support and affirmation. We are not self-sufficient because You want us to lean on one another, to learn Your own love for us. It is the way You have chosen to teach us that we are loved by Absolute Meaning, and that we possess intrinsic value as unique persons given the power to choose love of others over self.
Give us the grace to love as we should, to put others first and be freed to be loved in return.
“Since you have purified yourselves by obedience to the truth for sincere mutual love, love one another intensely from a pure heart.” -1 Peter
posted by KathrynTherese at 11:16 PM
14 Comments:
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Unless our own goodness is revealed to us by another’s unconditional love, we cannot know ourselves at all.
How true, how true. So, how awful when unconditional loves falls short and is conditional-- and we know it.
There are some in this world who do not know unconditional love from another, of course through no fault of their own! How are they to ever grasp the concept of God's love if they don't have ours first? If they aren't "worthy" enough to be loved by a fellow human, what on earth is ever going to convince them that Jesus personally accepted torture and death in their very name, for love of them?
Dave comes to mind, as I re-read your reflection. A multi-passed foster kid, then an adult in basic ed classes.. he has that psychological "disorder" in which someone has rubbed their eyes so much, there are permanent red or darkened circles..it is called the "raccoon" syndrome. I think maybe many psychological disorders are very natural responses to the wounds of not being loved enough; at one point, every name I filed away at a mental health center was that of someone I knew in town, and they seemed fine but here they are, labeled. As was my cousin, which stuck with her for life. Alright, that's MY problem to deal with, so back to Dave.
Dave, chronologically and visibly in his 40s but more like 12, hadn't been to class in a few days..we didn't know why until he came up to those few he trusted, with his blackened eye and bruised face, and said he'd been beaten up and had to go to the hospital. They took his wallet, laughed, and threw it down onto the sidewalk where they left him reeling from kick-broken ribs.
I will never forget the gift he gave me that day.. trust. Sheer trust, to say and do the right thing. He looked deeply into my eyes, smiling like a kick-broken dog, and waited. He had beer on his breath, at 10 am, even tho' he was no drinker. I was afraid to hug him, but people need to be touched, not simply commiserated with. That's why God gave us not only hands and arms and faces and lips, but also the sense of touch so as to feel any touch.
The secondary gift from Dave was his teaching me how to reach out in 100% vulnerability, even if you get another kick to the ribs.
Dave spoke more love than I did, but we told him that day who he was to us.
I am passionate about this, and I see you are as well, honora - loving one another unconditionally. We must be loved in order to know love, but often we are not loved as we should be...
We have all kinds of erroneous ideas about God and about man largely because there are so few who truly love selflessly, who love US selflessly and unconditionally. And why? Because they were not loved selflessly and unconditionally and so they do not really know the true nature of love.
Love is something that must be experienced to be known. We do not learn "how to love" from books or tv or admonition. It is rather more like fire: reading about fire creates no light or warmth; you have to be in the presence of true fire in order to experience what it is.
God occasionally helps certain souls to know love in adverse conditions, but ordinarily, He uses us to teach one another. But we too often fall down on the job. And the un-peaceful state of the world (and it has been an un-peaceful place since Eve picked that apple) is perpetual, it is nothing new. The Kingdom of Love and Peace is forever sprouting within us, but has never quite reached the geopolitical arena (though Charlemagne really tried - but he wasn't so good at real love on the personal level either).
We are fallen, we are free.
"The Kingdom of Love and Peace is forever sprouting within us.."
:-) I love the imagery.. I love even more the statement of that Truth. One can almost feel the quiet, exciting hum of His joy in His being among us, still.. What is it that we may give back? There is only one thing. Our whole heart, to offer with His to the Father--as First Communion clean aa the Holy Spirit via persona Christi can make it.
oops.. old eyes (old fingers, too) are doomed to make typos..
"as First Communion clean as the Holy Spirit via persona Christi can make it."
Dave...The Father reveals His truth to the small and the weak...
kathryntherese, I'm holding my breath...until your next post..when will you let me exhale again?
Well, FMN, that's the sad part.. Dave didn't know Him... it is such very very little ones among us who are the poorest of the poor. They have no one but us.
And yes, amen, post another thought so we can exhale, Lady K.
As for being passionate, I am unfortunately the kind who has made a priest scream at me. Um, twice. Tho' that shall never happen again. Bodily death/Purgatory could not possibly be worse than that time.
You say Dave didn't know Him, but the point is that He knows Dave. It's God that loves first. The most important thing, more important than our weak love for him is that He loves us. The poorest of the poor like a drug addict or a thief or a murderer, or a prostitute or any number of society's pariahs, or Dave...are especially loved by Him first. And they will precede the righteous into the Kingdom of Heaven.
So, perhaps the Lord gives us others to care for, besides our own?
Yes, but He loves of His own love even without our contribution. I've read and heard that God's glory and love do not increase one iota for anything we do in His name. And I've read that even though He is complete in His own Self and needs nothing, He is totally in love with us, and thus it can be perceived that He needs us. There is a hymn in Italian: "Christ has no hands, he has only our hands, to caress those in need. Christ has no feet, he has only our feet, to lead others to him."
Some important things are coming to mind and I think I'll post something about them on my blog.
:-)
I'm coming in late on these next few posts, kt, after having been away. This post is too filled with everything I could possibly agree with that it's difficult to say what hits me the most, but two things I would like to mention:
"We are made to become gift," and "...others' issues often seem clearer to us than our own..." Amen to both.
But something I would like to ask you; you say we cannot love a crowd, and of course I understand your meaning here, but I was just wondering - sometimes I am overwhelmed with love when viewing a crowd, even in a secular setting - does that ever happen to you?
And if Honora ever looks back here, I'd just like to tell her that I've been screamed at by a priest twice, both times in the confessional - it did the trick! (I hope...)
Sorry, maybe I should clarify that, just in case anyone thinks the priests were being unloving, because they weren't. One raised his voice about God's love, and the other about God's forgiveness. I think they were just trying to make sure I believed what they were saying.
It's believing the forgiving part that is so hard, especially when you have people around you who do not forgive...or forget. When you've been conditioned like Pavlov's dogs, to consider yourself unforgivable in your mind, even because you see it consistently confirmed by others whose opinions are TOO important to you because you need them (or you think you do)...it's hard to believe at least God DOES.
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