Learning to love what is unlovable

 The three feasts that we celebrate during the conclusion of Eastertide are at the heart of living the Christian life. Pentecost shows that The Holy Spirit is entrusted to us so that we can experience the love of God, The Trinity shows us how to grow in a total self-giving relationship with the other, while The Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ shows us that this love is tangible and offers our whole self for the good of others. It is the call to grow in a nuptial love that is not just centered on what I want but to discover what it is to love what is unlovable. This is at the heart of our lives in learning to love like God.

The heart of the Christian life is to grow into the heart of God. In our prayers, we discover it is not even about the quality or quantity of our prayers. This helps us to notice that our prayer is not just about how we feel or the amount of time we spend in prayer but rather that we become present to God in prayer. This is probably the most difficult discipline of prayer in actually showing up and discovering that our faithfulness to being present is at the heart of God. We show up even when we don't feel like it. This is the obedience of being willing to listen to God when our whole being rails against listening and would prefer to do our own thing. It means that we trust our whole selves to God even if we don't feel like it.

It also shows us the mutuality in seeking to love the other person even in their fragility, incompleteness, and sinfulness. This talks about how God seeks to be in a nuptial relationship with us and enter most deeply into a relationship that is all about giving and receiving the love of another. The mutual loving of another is known as the return model where love responds to love. This is what we are called to learn at the heart of a relationship. This is true in whatever state of life we are called to live our life. The central question is how am I called to love this other person even when I discover behaviors that I hate. This does not mean we compromise ourselves by just doing what the other person wants but rather discovering who it is that I need to be for them. I can only be myself but I can be myself for the good of the other. This chaste way of living allows us to see love through the eyes of another.

This then leads us to know what skin is in the game. This is not just loving as a part-time profession or a feel-good activity that we undertake on our terms. This will cost us everything in learning to love like God. In fact, this is the reality of the Incarnation that God shows up when we discover what is unlovable about our life. God actually turns up not because we have everything all together but because everything seems to be falling apart. This is not cheap grace because it costs the whole self for the good of the other. Our humanity protests that this is too much and that God cannot be serious but the divine call of ultimate poverty is that in giving everything we receive everything. In fact, this is the paradox of the Christian life we only discover ourselves when we fully give ourselves without the expectation of a particular reward. It also changes what we do when we discover fragility, frailty, and alienation within ourselves the call is not to eradicate "the sin" but to surrender everything to God.

So this is learning to love like God in discovering how we are called to be loved into life. As we enter what is called ordinary time we discover the extraordinary love of God that surrenders everything to us so that we can surrender everything to God,