I remember “Erich Fromm’s” quote from “The Art of Loving:”
“To have faith requires courage, the ability to take a risk, the readiness even to accept pain and disappointment. Whoever insists on safety and security as primary conditions of life cannot have faith; whoever shuts himself off in a system of defense, where distance and possession are his means of security, makes himself a prisoner. To be loved, and to love, need courage, the courage to judge certain values as of ultimate concern – and to take the jump and to stake everything on these values.”
During these past few days a feeling of awe crept over me. My memory worked with powerful commonplace. Everything appeared before me. Pages of history recall like artifacts found at an archeological dig. I heard every voice, every laugh, every tear, every moment.
Even when I sleep, my thoughts linger to that whom I love. So I ask, “Can love persist otherwise without sacrifice? Can we live and invent and breathe each other without demanding everything? Could I be comforted knowing that one is not mine and I’m not entirely another’s?”
Strange, what is faith in love? Can God sustain my love? Can God’s faith in us, overcome us; that is our fears, our dreams and society’s pressure? Can we look at our love and be set afire? Is there one with whom eternity sits in your arms, an encompassing glory of life at the core, of living, of breathing, of exhaling? Can you find that soul, in its dark night, where we felt captivated by love, by God’s love, Buddha’s love or that of our soulmate? Have you been discovered? Have you been called?
To all, how do you radiate unconquerable faith of love while anguishing from the loss of spiritual consolation? Even as a Buddhist, I often notice feelings of doubt, loneliness, and abandonment. Yet God dwells in that inaccessible light, and searingly, all images and ideas of Christ are washed by a “cloud of the unknown.”
William of St. Thierry counted on love to make good of the deficiencies of our feeble intellect. William said:
“Love itself is understanding. But love is not to be confused with mere feelings. Feelings burn out too easily; they can be manipulated or seduced. The love by which we see God must be an act of the will rather than a passing affection of the heart.”
Look upon your love. See God in him or her. See that presence, purifying the soul of all passions and hindrances, preparing for the inconceivable blessedness of divine union. Of laying in love, of caressing, of kissing, of holding and nurturing the soul.
Saint John said: “Oh, night more lovely than the dawn, Oh, night that joined Beloved with lover, Lover transformed in the Beloved!”
I remember the movie Elena Undone for this one quote, “In love, one and one are … one. Seldom do we get to experience the art in love.“
My love … join me? Let me experience your art?
Go experience art.