chastity crash course p.3 // what's lust and love got to do with it?

"All we need is love", sang the Beatles. "Love makes the world go round", said another song. Everybody says "I love you".

But what do we really mean when we say "love"? Mary Beth Bonacci observes the following...

"I love pizza. I love my parents. What’s the difference? What am I really saying with these last two statements? When I say I love my parents, it means that I want the best for them, that I’m willing to sacrifice to give them the best. When I say I love pizza, I’m just saying I love pizza. Do I have a relationship with pizza? Am I saying that if pizza has a problem, I’ll be there for it? (What?! No pepperoni?! I’ll get there!) Once I’m tired of pizza, I pretty much don’t care what happens to it."

Pope John Paul II explained, "Love is not merely a feeling; it is an act of will that consists of preferring, in a constant manner, the good of others to the good of oneself." In other words, love is more than a feeling and not judged by the intensity of the emotion. We must strive to know what’s best for others and decide or commit ourselves to bring this "good" to others.

Pope John Paul II clarifies that the opposite of love is not hate, but using. So what does it mean to love, and not to use? Let’s read what God said, "Love one another as I have loved you. (Jn 13:34). So how does God love us? "For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son..." (Jn 3:16). What did Jesus say in the Last Supper? "This is My Body which is given up to you..." Love seeks to lift the other person up towards his/her good, not bring him/her pain, depression, loneliness, anxiety or addiction.

So how can we find real love? When we sincerely give ourselves for the good of others. The Church said "Man cannot fully find himself, except through a sincere giving of himself (Gaudium et Spes)". Real love is focused on the other, pizza love is focused on self. Isn’t that beautiful?

Let’s try to see how much we understand it:

LOVE
= committed or uncommitted?
= faithful or unfaithful?
= live-giving or life-less?
= life-long or temporary?

PIZZA LOVE / LUST
= generous or selfish?
= deep or shallow?
= sensitive or insensitive?
= pure or impure?

Of course, love equates to the left options, and lust equates to the right options.

So...
Loves gives to the other. Lust uses the other.
Love treats another person like a person. Lust treats another person like an object.
Love cannot exist apart from its source, God. Lust is sexual desire apart from the love of God.
Love is honest and life-giving to all persons involved. Lust is devious and ultimately destructive to all persons involved.
Love seeks to do what is best for the other. Lust seeks to please the self.


Next in this series...
What does chastity mean and where does it place in sex and love? Why is abstinence not necessarily chastity?