Sometimes I run across a line that arrests me for the moment. I am caught up and forced to reflect on what I just read. That is always fun and funny. I read quite a bit. Every day I read newspapers, essays, religious stuff, etc. It would be fun to know how many sentences per day I read. So when I hit one of those sentences that arrest me for the moment, I am grateful. Something about a sentence is so profound that I cannot go on. I am stopped for the moment and for a reason. I need to reflect---to take in and process what I have just read.
I hit one of those sentences again when I was re-reading one of my favorite books by Richard Rohr, Everything Belongs. I like Rohr because he is a Catholic and, therefore, has a different upbringing than I did. He grew up in a fairly conservative Kansas Catholic family. We are about the same age, so we have been through similar periods of history. We both have become ecumenically sensitive and have tried to find our place in the interfaith dialogue which is important for how various faith traditions across the globe will need to get along.
Since I was reading Rohr’s book who knows how many times, I was not really looking for a sentence to jump out and grab me. But I was grabbed nevertheless. In fact, the sentence was really a question. Rohr asked, “Have you ever been loved well by someone?” (105) It was interesting how I processed this innocent question. If I am honest, I think I probably answered it three different ways: yes, no and maybe!
It is a hard question for me (and maybe for many of us) because we are not quite sure how to let the question be received by ourselves. Let me clarify. In the first place I recognize the question would be easier if the adverb, “well,” were not in the sentence. No doubt, if I were asked if I have been loved by someone, the answer would be a sure and immediate, yes. Of course, I have been loved by someone. I suspect that most people would affirm they have been loved. Between parents, friends, special ones in our lives and so forth, surely we have been loved.
But that little adverb---well---makes it a much tougher question to answer. Have I been loved well by someone? I mumble and fumble. I want to answer yes, but how can you be sure? Is my standard of having been loved well so high, no human being could possibly love me well? Do I get to decide by being loved well looks like or can the other person decide? I can lower my standard of what being loved well means, in order to be able to answer it with a resounding yes.
Am I the only person who would waffle on this question? I realize I can flip the question and ask, have I ever loved anyone well? I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. I would like to think I have loved well. But what would the other person say? If I think about loving someone well, do I lower the standards so that I pass the test? It is easy to give myself grace that I might not extend quite as easily to another person.
And of course, in all this I have not even raised the question about the nature of love itself. So not only do I have an issue with the adverb, well, I can now raise an issue with both the verb, “love.” In Rohr’s sentence the word, love, is a verb. It is easy to realize that word can be both a verb and a noun. But I always tell students the verbs are primary. If you have never been loved or have loved, you probably don’t really know anything about the noun, love.
Fortunately, Rohr might be interested in my conundrums, but that is not actually his point. We get to his point when we read a little further. Rohr tells us whatever we decide about other human beings loving us well, we can know for sure that God does love us this way. Rohr tells us that God loves us so well, we can claim and bask in the security of that love. In effect, we can be very confident that God loves us in a way, we never question the fact. That it can become a fact means the verb, love, turns into the noun, love. And God’s love is such that we know what the adverb, being loved well, actually feels like. It is firm and secure.
I am sure this is the core teaching of Jesus. And it might just be the same for Muslims and Buddhists and some of the other major traditions. This is so true that we can be confident and secure. And if we allow this confidence and security in our lives, there is no reason not to be ecumenically sensitive and active in interfaith dialogue. If we can accept that we have been loved well---at least by God, if not others in our lives---then we can relax, be open and be prepared to do God’s work of loving in the world.
If I had all these questions, probably others do too. Maybe those of us who know something about God’s love, can accept it and embody it. We can become instruments of that love in the world. We can call it compassion or agape. It might even be so benign that sometimes it simply feels like care. I like to think caring for someone is a baby form of love. And if we do that well, then we can begin to grow up that kind of love. It is hard to start with compassion.
I am grateful for Rohr’s arresting sentence. It provokes me to think about one of the most important questions of my life. Have I been loved well? Am I able to love well?
I hit one of those sentences again when I was re-reading one of my favorite books by Richard Rohr, Everything Belongs. I like Rohr because he is a Catholic and, therefore, has a different upbringing than I did. He grew up in a fairly conservative Kansas Catholic family. We are about the same age, so we have been through similar periods of history. We both have become ecumenically sensitive and have tried to find our place in the interfaith dialogue which is important for how various faith traditions across the globe will need to get along.
Since I was reading Rohr’s book who knows how many times, I was not really looking for a sentence to jump out and grab me. But I was grabbed nevertheless. In fact, the sentence was really a question. Rohr asked, “Have you ever been loved well by someone?” (105) It was interesting how I processed this innocent question. If I am honest, I think I probably answered it three different ways: yes, no and maybe!
It is a hard question for me (and maybe for many of us) because we are not quite sure how to let the question be received by ourselves. Let me clarify. In the first place I recognize the question would be easier if the adverb, “well,” were not in the sentence. No doubt, if I were asked if I have been loved by someone, the answer would be a sure and immediate, yes. Of course, I have been loved by someone. I suspect that most people would affirm they have been loved. Between parents, friends, special ones in our lives and so forth, surely we have been loved.
But that little adverb---well---makes it a much tougher question to answer. Have I been loved well by someone? I mumble and fumble. I want to answer yes, but how can you be sure? Is my standard of having been loved well so high, no human being could possibly love me well? Do I get to decide by being loved well looks like or can the other person decide? I can lower my standard of what being loved well means, in order to be able to answer it with a resounding yes.
Am I the only person who would waffle on this question? I realize I can flip the question and ask, have I ever loved anyone well? I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. I would like to think I have loved well. But what would the other person say? If I think about loving someone well, do I lower the standards so that I pass the test? It is easy to give myself grace that I might not extend quite as easily to another person.
And of course, in all this I have not even raised the question about the nature of love itself. So not only do I have an issue with the adverb, well, I can now raise an issue with both the verb, “love.” In Rohr’s sentence the word, love, is a verb. It is easy to realize that word can be both a verb and a noun. But I always tell students the verbs are primary. If you have never been loved or have loved, you probably don’t really know anything about the noun, love.
Fortunately, Rohr might be interested in my conundrums, but that is not actually his point. We get to his point when we read a little further. Rohr tells us whatever we decide about other human beings loving us well, we can know for sure that God does love us this way. Rohr tells us that God loves us so well, we can claim and bask in the security of that love. In effect, we can be very confident that God loves us in a way, we never question the fact. That it can become a fact means the verb, love, turns into the noun, love. And God’s love is such that we know what the adverb, being loved well, actually feels like. It is firm and secure.
I am sure this is the core teaching of Jesus. And it might just be the same for Muslims and Buddhists and some of the other major traditions. This is so true that we can be confident and secure. And if we allow this confidence and security in our lives, there is no reason not to be ecumenically sensitive and active in interfaith dialogue. If we can accept that we have been loved well---at least by God, if not others in our lives---then we can relax, be open and be prepared to do God’s work of loving in the world.
If I had all these questions, probably others do too. Maybe those of us who know something about God’s love, can accept it and embody it. We can become instruments of that love in the world. We can call it compassion or agape. It might even be so benign that sometimes it simply feels like care. I like to think caring for someone is a baby form of love. And if we do that well, then we can begin to grow up that kind of love. It is hard to start with compassion.
I am grateful for Rohr’s arresting sentence. It provokes me to think about one of the most important questions of my life. Have I been loved well? Am I able to love well?
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