THIS I BELIEVE

(Photo by Tyler Nix)

Orig, Aug, 2022 – Rev. Jan, 2024

Following are two quotes from MLK, Jr. whom I admired and followed for years. I finally met him in 1968 in Detroit, one month before he was assassinated in Memphis on April 4. He was 39 years old.  I was 31.  That experience changed the trajectory of my life. More details about that time are in Chapter Three, “Turbulent Times: Rocking the Boat” in Seven Decades: A Learning Memoir.”

“I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality.”

 “I choose love because hate is too great a burden to bear.”

MLK, Jr.  (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968)

Those of us limited to English have one word, love, which is used for loving everything from ourselves and what we do, to another person, to our families, to our dogs, cats, and horses, to our cars and other material things, to the essence of nature itself. There is also the religious dimension expressed in various world religions and among indigenous and native people most often referring to a higher power beyond ourselves. There are different names in different cultures for that creative force that has loved us into being.  Yahweh, God, Allah, Shiva or Vishnu, Kami, Shen, Ngai, Jah, Biame, Wakan Tanka, Gtiche Manitou, Waheguru and Zeus, among others.

Native people who live in and with the natural world seem to grasp the essence of our being more than most. This is why many of us find a measure of peace and joy immersed in the world of nature where we love belonging as participants.  We can find ways to love nature a little more and better if we want to protect and preserve it for future generations.

Greek is an example of a language that has 4 different words for love.  Here’s a brief definition of each one.

Eros – most easily translated as erotic or physical love characterized by deep emotions of attraction and desire, expressed in sexual behaviors and sensual experiences.

Philos – filial love seen as “brotherly” or “sisterly” love, used for love between family members, between friends, and a desire or enjoyment of an activity.

Storge – familial love, that strong bond of love from parents to their children, and vice-versa.

Agape – unconditional love, powerful redeeming love, empathic love and acceptance.

A Biblical description of love appears in the New Testament in Paul’s first letter to the new church community in Corinth.  The church was struggling and in conflict. Paul wanted to urge them to come together around this common bond of love as he understood it. The letter was written around 53-54 c.e. and probably delivered by Titus.

Among the myriad problems in the Corinthian church were claims of spiritual superiority over one another, suing one another in public courts, abusing the sacrament of Holy Communion, and sexual misbehavior. If that sounds familiar in today’s world, so be it.  Paul wrote to demand that the early church community in Corinth step up to higher ethical and moral standards.  In the Greek language of the New Testament, the word for love used in this letter is agape.

“If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

⁸ Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away ….

¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” (from the New International Version, released in 1978 with a minor revision in 1984 and a major revision in 2011.)

“The act of love is the surrender of self into life as it is. This is a love larger than our word “love” can contain or express. It embraces all of life and does not judge: tragedy and war, suffering and joy, creativity and destruction. Beauty. Death. The Other. Within this embrace of life as it is, lie acceptance, forgiveness, healing.”   Anne Hillman in “The Dancing Animal Woman.”

How are you expressing your love this year, for yourself, for others and for the world at large?  We have a choice every day to tell the truth, to be kind and loving and to be the best version of who we are. We hold within us the possibility of making the world a little brighter.