What is Love? (Baby Don't Hurt Me)

Love. It seems today that we’re all obsessed with it. How to get it, how to lose it, what it means, what it doesn’t mean. Yesterday, while I was at mass, God gave me a glimpse of what he intended love to be. As I was going up for communion, I spotted a couple walking up to receive the Eucharist. The husband was blind, and he was being gently guided by his wife up to the altar. She softly gave him directions and held his back and his hand as she guided him to receive Jesus. She brought her husband to the priest, where he received communion, and made sure he was completely taken care of before receiving communion herself. It was incredible to watch. As she was going up, it was clear that her main priority was getting her husband to Jesus. And he trusted her completely.
This is how love is supposed to work. We are to put one another before ourselves. In a culture that screams individualism and independence, this message can sometimes seem like a nice thought, but we have a hard time putting it to practice. This doesn’t mean we let people walk all over us or take advantage of us, but it does mean that we are to give of ourselves in a way that seeks someone else’s good over our own.
Another thing that I saw happening in this scene was that the wife was leading her husband to Jesus. She didn’t tell him not to go to communion because it was hard for him to walk on his own. She didn’t get it for him and bring it back to him at his seat. She walked with him. She guided him. She supported him. She sought his good. All of these things she did because she wanted him to be in communion with Jesus. This is what love does. If we truly love, we will lead others to Jesus. We need God and the graces he gives, and love knows it, and says, “I’ll do anything to get you to God, no matter what it takes.”
Think of someone you love. Are you leading them to Christ, or away from him? Are you constantly demanding things from the people you love, or do you find yourself seeking ways to give your time, money, and presence?
No blog post aimed at igniting conviction is complete without a challenge, so I’ll give you some. Give someone a ride to a location that is out of your way. Do someone a favor, especially if it inconveniences you. Pay a complement to the person you compare yourself to the most. Apologize for something you did or said during a moody day, even if the person you are apologizing to does not remember the offense. Draw someone a picture. Do a chore that you are not responsible for. Do all of these things with pure joy, and be happy to do them again.
“Supposing that in the winter, coming back from Perugia, I arrive in pitch darkness at the Portiuncula. Icicles are clinging to my habit and making my legs bleed. Covered with mud and snow, starving and freezing, I shout and knock for a long time. ‘Who is there’ asks the porter when he finally decides to come. ‘It is I, Brother Francis.’ But he doesn’t recognize my voice. ‘Off with you, prankster!’ he replies. ‘This is no time for jokes!’ I insist, but he won’t listen. ‘Will you be off, you rascal? There are enough of us without you! And there is no use in your coming here. Smart men like us don’t need idiots like you around. Go, try your luck at the Crosiers’ hospice!”
“Once more, I beg him not to leave me outside on a night like that, and implore him to open up. He opens up, all right. ‘Just you wait, impudent cur! I’ll teach you some manners!’ And, grabbing a knobby club, he jumps on me, seizes me by the hood, and drags me through the snow, beating me and wounding me with all the knobs in his cudgel… Well, Leo, if I am able to bear all this for love of God, not only with patience but with happiness, convinced that I deserve no other treatment, know, remember, and write down on your paper, God’s Little Sheep, that at last I have found perfect joy.” (St. Francis of Assisi, A Biography)
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