What is Love?

Beginning with Paul's letter to the Corinthians, love is patient, kind, it does not boast, is not proud, does not dishonour, is not self-seeking, is not easily angered, keeps no record of wrongs, does not delight in evil, always protects, trusts, hopes and perseveres.

So that is pretty straight forward. There are six things that love is and seven things it is not according to this Biblical passage. 

For Will Shakespeare - "love is not love which alters when it alteration finds ... it is an ever fixed mark that looks on tempests ... and is never shaken.

You have to be older than twenty to appreciate Shakespeare's instruction. It is an idealistic notion and I can see how this might be true and how it might not. However he does carry some authority because of all the plays he wrote that we still love because his characters resemble a timeless authenticity. He has earned his credibility.

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.”
― Lao Tzu

In my life this is true. As a young child I was loved and so grew to be an adult, then was loved again. These are markers in my life where I could have discounted the love I received because it was less than perfect, or the courage to carry on when my love was also imperfect.


“We’re all a little weird. And life is a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness—and call it love—true love.”
― Robert Fulghum, True Love

Weirdness is another word for the unpredictable, for diversity of experience.  Love does not attempt to prove that it exists, it is not a chemical compound, the GDP, or "jobs and the economy".  Is love the reason for these things? Not exclusively but perhaps to allow love to remain.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” 

― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

And so the most powerful people on earth might have been successful at locking away their hearts to leave a clear head for strategy - to keep their lovers on a leash to use at their convenience. Or the most broken people on earth have locked away their hearts because their experience leads them to believe that is the only way they can survive. This is what Karen Armstrong calls the "reptilian brain".

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it--always.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

There are so many friends around, so many people who base their work on love and truth. We are not famous because we are abundant. We don't remark on them as something distant like a news headline because we know them. Diverse, imperfect - we need your help. Need you to be clear in mind and heart so that we can get behind the trends that lead us to more happiness and less suffering.

Yes all these quotes but one are from men. Why is that? Why did I choose men rather than women? I chose those who were well known in many nations and women are not as celebrated globally in that sense. However I will end with a quote by Hannah Arendt which I think is the most profound.

"Love, by its very nature, is unworldly, and it is for this reason rather than its rarity that it is not only apolitical but antipolitical perhaps the most powerful of all antipolitical forces." Hannah Arendt.

Things I cannot prove

Lotta Hitschmanova - photo by USC Canada

While I agree it's good to have facts back up our beliefs there are some that cannot be proven no matter how much research I do.  It is part of my experience to be perceptive, to sense what is happening around me, and after many years of dismissing many of these perceptions because of a lack of proof, I believe they have some element of value. 

For example I cannot prove that Jesus, who, according to scriptures, was nailed to a cross – died for our sins, not to save us from our sins as the Christian doctrine says.  Certainly these doctrines have been studied by scholars and priests for many centuries, and for whom I would never doubt their intelligence, but there is a theme in these teachings that reach me in a very deep and disturbing way.

The meaning of this story, comes from my first impression as a child. It is a warning of what happens to those who challenge authority. The imagery is so powerful it hardly needs thinking about.  The son of man (and woman) nailed to a cross, naked, and left to die a long and excruciating death, for advocating a spiritual life – what child wouldn't get that message deep under their soft skin?

After two thousand years of evolving doctrines, the most fanatic adherents have been willing to mutilate, torture, burn and murder for their Christ without feeling any apparent conflict to their Savior's message in life – although I have no way of knowing the conscience of crusaders.

What is that sin we are guilty of, that allowed him to be crucified? Is it the original sin – being born of woman, of sexual desire, of being imperfect? Or is it that we (mortals) failed to climb on the cross, remove the nails and set the Christ free?

This question is, of course, naïve, and all the arguments, interpretations, are irrelevant no matter how eloquent or learned they may be – except the meaning that most impacts the followers. 

Some dismiss religion entirely.  After all history reveals our vainglory.  The teachings of Christianity have been selected and altered to fit the politics of the day.  First it was used to make the people suspicious of their own intellects and judgement, and to fear their own desires and needs.  Then it taught misogyny, a hatred of feminine wisdom. It  forced men to doubt their own feelings and fears, to become soldiers and cannon fodder. Then it taught followers to hate those who did not share their religion and race. Instead of teaching the love of Christ it taught religious intolerance.  It taught that suffering was good for you and at the same time, taught that those who suffered ill-health, poverty, injustice – must have angered God and so their suffering came with shame and guilt.

Now that a new tool of propaganda has been invented, religion is not essential.   Now voice-overs, images, TV shows, movies, consumerism, and the internet, can broadcast the doctrines that keep us serving – what exactly? Ideology? Technology? The corporate elite? Racial supremacy? Patriarchy?

Are all these things evil or are they different versions of the same thing? Should we get rid of them all and return to community and nature?  Would we then be free of oppression?  

I don’t know.  All their messages point to some truths, but they don’t willingly tell the whole truth.  Religion has also given us Mahatma Gandhi, Albert Schweitzer, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Buber, Martin Luther King Jr., Lotta Hitschmanova, KarenArmstrong, the Dalai Lama and many others who have inspired great movements.

Although I can’t prove it I believe ideology is a way of ordering life without the agony of attempting to understand it.  It’s an operating system, under different names, we willingly give in to,  in the hopes we’ll rise to a position of power that will enable us to feel  superior.  We submit to doctrines, game plans, education, clubs – believing we can reach the top, change the rules, or change the system.

So the story of Jesus, like the story of the witch hunts, the French revolution, war, capitalism, communism, and The Wizard of Oz – are all about the worship of power over the use of responsible democratic power that comes from within. Their cautionary tales reveal our inability to transcend the operating systems that punish those who seek alternatives to structural violence.  Those who affirm life through love instead of hate.  Those who work for the greater good of all. I can’t prove it but I keep seeing it this way.