2-12-18<\/p>\n
St Valentine is one of those saints who has become known as much for not having lived as for the sacred ascriptions to his disputed existence. The Catholic Church removed him from its calendar of actual saints some years ago, bowing to the back-canonical aspect of his legend. Like some other former saints, he might have been invented to fill a need.<\/p>\n
Or, there having been several priests and martyrs named Valentine during Christianity\u2019s first few centuries, the saint associated with love and high interpersonal devotion might be an amalgam.<\/p>\n
In any case \u2013 and to the extent we keep in context the elements of remembering loved ones, and the power of love, and the encouragement to love \u2013 we can affirm the flowers and cards and hugs. Hallmark and ProFlowers and CandyGrams aside, it is good to revere love in the larger sense.<\/p>\n
Love, actually, is not love if considered, and exercised, outside<\/em> the \u201clarger\u201d context. People have tried to define the distinctions between humankind and beasts \u2013 laughing, cruelty, imagination, disco music \u2013 but Loving must be the predominant quality. We can receive love; we can offer love; we can act according to love, at least when we are not hating, and this explains a lot of history\u2019s art and music and literature and poetry. <\/p>\n Can we understand it? Not fully, I say… but that is part of its allure and fascinating essence. I also think we are fated to only imperfectly express love: and even then only to the extent we can receive it.<\/p>\n \u201cLove is patient, love is kind… \u201d<\/p>\n Which gets us face-to-face with God\u2019s love. His love created the world \u2013 the universe and all therein. His love supersedes His vengeful aspects in that while we were yet sinners, He sent His only Son to become flesh and dwell among us, and take upon Himself the punishment we deserve for our rebellion. That is love.<\/p>\n As I asked above, Can we understand it? As I answered, not fully. We never will. But we can accept it.<\/p>\n Recently we shared thoughts here about unanswered prayer. Can a loving God say No to our earnest pleas? As God, fulfilling His job description so to speak, He knows what we need, even when we are persistent about things we want. The basis of that (as if He needs to justify Himself\u2026 but understanding this helps our faith) is\u2026 Love.<\/p>\n The heart is a fist-sized organ with fleshy tubes in and out, chambers, valves, and uncountable pulsations. How this hard-working bloody thing came to be associated by poets and painters, saints and sages, with the tenderest of often indescribable emotions is another thing I will never understand.<\/p>\n Yet we draw heart shapes when we are in love, despite the fact they don\u2019t resemble hearts. We send drawings of them to those we love; we carve them into tree trunks. Even the worst characters in history have loved someone \u2013 a girl or guy; their mothers; a pet. It is a disease for which there is no immunity. Thank God.<\/p>\n On the other hand, the human race is not immune to the Broken Heart either. In a way, these sad experiences validate the positive truth and power of romantic love: it is not abstract, not an illusion. To paraphrase the poet: Love is real! Love is earnest!<\/p>\n Returning to the God-foundation of these matters (as He is the foundation of all things), even God has not escaped the reality of a Broken Heart. He identifies with our sorrow, our grief, and to the aspect of love that can \u201cleave a hole\u201d in our emotions.<\/p>\n God Himself? Yes, despite His plans and ordained Will, He knew \u2013 He knows \u2013 what it is like to lose a Son. But God so loved the world\u2026<\/p>\n Please think of love, then, as more than the cheap theme for a holiday; and don\u2019t let it ever become a cheap theme in your life.<\/p>\n + + +<\/p>\n