Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not, dealeth
not perversely; is not puffed up;
Is not ambitious, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to
anger, thinketh no evil;
Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth with the truth;
Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all
things, endureth all things.
Charity never falleth away…
(1 Corinthians
13:4-8 Douay Rheims)
I was reading Corinthians the other day for my Theology course here in Rome. I've never given St. Paul the attention he deserves in my life - He truly is brilliant, and I've been missing out. He gives the Corinthians, as well as countless readers of his letters to this day, an understanding of true love in his highest form. The Greeks believed that there were three kinds of love, Eros, Philia, and Agape, and it makes sense why the earliest Christians adapted this Greek word of agape into their understanding of Divine Love. I was reading Archbishop Fulton J Sheen for as well, and he speaks on the matter of true love, confirming St. Paul’s words in many of his own statements actually. He says that “Christians had to find a new word to describe that love of God who became man and who died for our sins. And so they took this rarely used (Greek) word, agape, and they used it for love. For example, that famous, most beautiful passage on love in all literature is in the letter of Paul to the Corinthians.” He explains why Christians used the word agape, because “Love is, in agape, something that is unreciprocated; is loving when love is not returned.” Also, when Jesus asks St. Peter in John 21 this question of love three times, “Peter, do you love me?”, He used a different word for the word ‘love’ the third time and that was recorded as the word Agape. Obviously there is a strong connection between St. Paul’s and Archbishop Sheen’s definition of love. This Christian definition of love is pure sacrifice, and involves putting others’ wants and needs above oneself. Both St. Paul and Archbishop Sheen point to the cross as the pinnacle example of what love truly is. I saw this link between their teachings on love in the comparison of their writings. “Love burdens itself with the wants and woes and losses and even the wrongs of others” Fulton says, and again he confirms the words of Paul, “Love is the key to the mystery. Love by its very nature is not selfish, but generous. It seeks not its own, but the good of others. The measure of love is not the pleasure it gives-that is the way the world judges it-but the joy and peace it can purchase for others.” My meditation after this research was that by putting others needs above our own in little ways, in forgiveness and humility, we can actually, literally, attain this divine Love of which St. Paul speaks about. Through the intercession of the faithful souls of St. Paul the Apostle and Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, I honestly hope to attain this goal of True Love, of ultimate sacrifice, although it sounds pretty much impossible.
