The Way We Love

A borrowed inspiration from my favorite Franciscan, the amazing, soul-stirring Fr. Richard Rohr. 

Father Richard describes how we can grow in our love for God: 

​"The God Jesus incarnates and embodies is not a distant God that must be placated. Jesus’ God is not sitting on some throne demanding worship and throwing down thunderbolts like Zeus. Jesus never said, “Worship me”; he said, “Follow me.” He asks us to imitate him in his own journey of full incarnation. To do so, he gives us the two great commandments: (1) Love God with your whole heart, soul, mind, and strength and (2) Love your neighbor as yourself (Mark 12:28–31; Luke 10:25–28). In the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:29–37), Jesus shows us that our “neighbor” even includes our “enemy.” 

"So how do we love God? Most of us seem to have concluded we love God by attending church services. For some reason, we think that makes God happy. I’m not sure why.

"Jesus never talked about attending services, although church can be a good container to start with. I believe our inability to recognize and love God in what is right in front of us has allowed us to separate religion from our actual lives. There is Sunday morning, and then there is real life. 
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"The only way I know how to teach anyone to love God, and how I myself seek to love God, is to love what God loves, which is everything and everyone, including you and including me!

 “We love because God first loved us” (1 John 4:19). “If we love one another, God remains in us, and God’s love is brought to perfection in us” (1 John 4:12).

"Then we love with God’s infinite love that can always flow through us. We are able to love things for themselves and in themselves—and not for what they do for us. That takes both work and surrender. As we get ourselves out of the way, there is a slow but real expansion of consciousness. We are not the central reference point anymore.

"We love in greater and greater circles until we can finally do what Jesus did: love and forgive even our enemies."