St. Philip Neri, Priest (Memorial)
By Lorenz S. Centino, Jr.
John 15: 9 - 11
9 As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love.
10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.
11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.
PERSONAL REFLECTIONS:
A BLESSED THURSDAY TO ALL!!!
LOVE is defined in many ways by different people. And it is defined from different point of views and according to various perspectives of experience. This is so because love is an abstract concept that can be speculated, talk about and applied in many ways. But whatever is the definition, I think love becomes more meaningful in the context of the inner drive for RELATIONSHIP or ATTACHMENT- may it be to objects, beliefs, persons, or a deity. Love is an outward push from within towards what brings satisfaction and happiness.
To love is to obtain happiness. No one loves for pain or suffering, though most of the times loving is also risking to be hurt and suffer. In the Gospel today Jesus is giving us a perspective of obtaining HAPPINESS by LOVING HIM. To love Jesus is to ABIDE by his/God's COMMANDMENTS! Jesus makes himself the model of this kind of love as he always abides by his Father’s will. Jesus came, as he categorically claimed, to do the will of his Father.
To love Jesus is not just to be attached to/with him in an intimate and personal relationship. To love him is to KEEP his commandments. To love Jesus, therefore, requires the promotion and carrying out of his COMMANDMENTS anywhere, anytime and in whatever circumstance. Loving Jesus is surrendering one’s will to his will. It is this keeping his commandments, surrendering to his will, which brings JOY in its FULLNESS. He said, "These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full." Keeping Jesus/God’s commandments, however, may lead to suffering because loving Jesus/God may cause confrontation, defiance and resistance to anything that go against Jesus/God’s will. Yet, the reward of such suffering is the fullness of happiness with God in his Kingdom.
A true Christian then is he/she who never forgets his/her faith in whatever responsibility he/she is attending to, never leaves God in the Church when he/she engages in business, practices his/her profession, or in making a legislation and policy that influence people in their decision making. A true Christian who LOVES GOD is GLORIFYING God in all his/her ACTIONS by keeping God in his/her daily undertakings. The JOY of every Christian who LOVES GOD is being FAITHFUL to GOD in SERVING MEN and WOMEN!
Loving the one and only God is the first commandment. The second one is to love your neighbor. Truly, you cannot live by loving God alone, but by loving your neighbors as well. Now, with these two, you can start defining love. Third person in this matter is irrelivant. It is between you and the one and only God.
ReplyDeleteI will be expecting a more healthy article from you then. Paalam.
thanks for the sharing. i just read it now. but it is not my primary intention to bring up a "healthy article" ( i'm just not sure what you mean by it) but a point of reference for anybody's reflection, whether they agree with mine or not. with regards to defining love, i started saying that it can be defined in different ways. for me a third person always matter when one considers love. the third person can never be irrelevant just as you claimed that one can not live by loving God alone but also loving one's neighbor. every third person is a neighbor in horizon of love.
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