What Does “God Is Love” Mean?
The Church gives the key to understanding God. Once again, Deacon Michael puts on his scholar cap and shows us that the Church truly brings us the fulfillment of Jesus' prediction, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out of his storehouse good things, both old and new.”
The Church has been blessed with great saints, like St. Augustine, who fulfilled this role of showing us the way to understanding Jesus. Not only do they show us the good things of Christ, but they give us the keys to open the treasury for ourselves and bring forth good things, both old and new.
Written by Laura Weston, widow of Deacon Michael
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St. Augustine was a great mind and wrote on many subjects. And as I was saying before, there is, within the teachings of Christ, the truth.
But additionally, there is within the teaching of Christ a call to think. And one of the issues that we face as Christians, as Catholics, is to try to look at the teachings of Christ and understand them. To come to a greater understanding and through that understanding incorporate them in the ways that we live. And so one of the things that we have to do to accomplish that end is to take a teaching of Christ, or an understanding of Christ, and apply it to our lives and to the world.
And how do we do it? We have two excellent examples in the readings today: first the letter of St. John and then the gospel of Matthew. If you listen to them and read what you have here, you have a logical structure that is being presented by John initially, being presented by John to basically understand who God is. He starts from a premise and then works from that premise to the conclusion. This is something that is inherent in ancient Judaism, but it also reflects in this instance some of the logical thought processes that you found in the Greek world.
When you see Plato, Aristotle, and you hear about the Greek philosophers, basically what is involved is a logical structure. The logical structure is being incorporated into Christianity partly through this letter of St. John's and the gospel of St. John and all throughout the entire New Testament and it is being articulated within a logical structure.
For example, we start in the letter of St. John: "Beloved, let us love one another because love is of God and everyone who loves in begotten by God and knows God." And so you then follow that basic premise through a logical structure to reach a conclusion. The conclusion that St. John has is "God is love and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him."
What does that mean? To understand what that means requires that you have a logical structure in which to understand it. Oh, God is love. I remember in the 1960s. Peace! Great t-shirts. The t-shirts were really good. The tie-dyed t-shirts in all the wonderful colors. " Love. Hey man, love." That doesn't reflect a logical structure, that reflects a reflexive action that doesn't really require thought.
What does love mean? And what does it mean that God is love?
Does it mean, by the nature of our humanity, and by the nature of creation of itself, that, absent God, there is no love. Okay, well that makes sense. But does it also mean that in our lives, when we partake of love, when we love, we are simply partaking of the love that God makes available to us. That it’s almost like there is this great tank of love and that when we love a husband and wife are in love, we love our children, we love each other, we love our neighbor, that in fact what we are doing is going in and taking out of this inexhaustible reservoir of God that is love.
Is that the proper approach? And how do you know that is the proper approach? How do you know that it is correct? How do you know that you're not doing something like Martin Luther and going off on a tangent that leads you where you're not supposed to be? What is the ability of Christianity, Catholicism, to say, "No. You're not going the right way." We have the catechism. But beyond that it’s a thought process.
We know that, and Robert, I'm sorry I pick on you like this, but he's just there. We know that me coming up and hitting you is not a sign of love. How do we know that? How do we not know that there is not something, in fact, that is wrong with Robert. And that if I didn't hit him, he would die. We don't know that.
To reach those conclusions with regard to what is consistent with love, with the teachings of the Church, we have to have the ability to think. That is one of the great things that St. Augustine did. He was a great thinker and he wrote down his ideas of articulating what it means to be a follower of Christ, which is one of the reasons he is a doctor of the Church.
We see this, also, this logical structure, in the gospel of Matthew where Jesus is talking about the primacy of Christ. And He basically goes through the process, "don't be called father", "don't be called rabbi" and then ends it with, if you are to eschew all of these things that important people in the world like to get: if I'm the ruler I want people to think I'm exalted, I'm wonderful, I'm all of these things; if I'm rich, I want you to think I'm wonderful; if part of the teachings of Christ is to avoid those various, those very things, logically what does that mean?
And Matthew articulates it and says, you don't want to be all of these things, don't be these things. “Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” And that logically means that when you are called to love one another it isn't a love that is given from on high to those who are lower, but it is given to everybody regardless of position. And by virtue of loving your neighbor you cannot exalt yourself. Because exaltation in itself, self-exaltation, places you in a hierarchical position that is contrary to loving neighbor.
This kind of logical structure, like I said, you see it throughout the New Testament, you see it in the Old Testament with a different structure, and you see it through the history of the Church. Just for purposes of understanding, we will do the Nicene Creed today. You will see the very structure that comes out of the council. The logical structures that leads to exactly what is said there. It is all set within a logical structure.
St. Augustine’s great fame, is that he articulated and gave us the ability to look at Christ and to come to a greater understanding. To come to a greater understanding of what John is saying, for example, "Beloved, let us love one another because love is of God" and then following it with "God is love". And what does that mean for our relationship and the teachings of Christ to love God and to love neighbor? Where does it leave it?
Because the mere words, although they have meaning, only truly have meaning if we understand. And the only way to understand is to think about it. And God, in His great wisdom, in His great generosity, has given us, specifically within the Catholic Church, these wonderful great saints who give us the ability, through their ability to think, their ability to analyze, their ability to understand and their holiness, a way to come to a greater understanding of what it means to be a Christian and a member of the Holy Catholic Church.
And in this, you find St. Augustine, saint of the Church and doctor of the Church, spreading the knowledge that is incumbent and within Jesus Christ and His Holy Catholic Church.
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