This is an open-comment theology blog where I will post various theological musings, mostly in sermon or essay form, for others to read and comment on. If what I say here interests you, you may want to check out some of my books. Feel free to criticize, to critique, to comment, but keep comments to the point and respectful. Many of these posts have been published elsewhere, but I wanted them collected and made available to a wider audience.
Friday, March 29, 2013
What Is Love? What is faith?
I don't know what other people experience, I cannot share in the phenomenal content of your experiences. It is epistemologically impossible for me to do so. In philosophy they call this "the problem of other minds". So maybe you experience love differently than I. But this is what love is like FOR ME. It is as if all the great myths of man's history are true. It is like there is something truly eternal in the world, something beyond the realm of the senses, something transcendent, alive, and caring (i.e., not indifferent, meaning that what you do makes a different to him/her). In other words it is AS IF there were a God. That God stands between me and the other, holding both of us in Her embrace. I love you, I God you. It as if all those great cosmic stories are true, and standing with me, I'm within them. I have been blessed to have so, many, relationships that are truly divine in this way. I get to say "I love you" a lot. Each one is different in important ways, of course. But behind the differences there is essential unity, a unifying quality and principle, and it is this religious truth. Maybe the feeling is just a feeling. Maybe it is only LIKE those thing ate true. But the experience is what it is. Plus, what wonders are open to us if what seems to be true in love, is true. How important is living into that truth, if love and truth are one. Giving oneself over to that thought, taking that chance, living that (possible) truth. What is that, but faith?
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