True Love 

   “And love, be it understood, is not the desire to have, to own, to possess – that is selfishness.  Love is the desire to be had, to be owned, to be possessed.” (Fulton J. Sheen, “Simple Truths: Thinking Life Through with Fulton J. Sheen”) 

   When we truly love someone we forfeit ourselves, our hopes, our wishes, and our desires in favor of those of the one we love.  It is a deliberate act of giving, not an emotional response to physical desires and needs.  In our fallen humanity we seem to be unable to separate the physical from the spiritual in loving one another.  We often place demands on others to earn our love.  If they don’t meet those demands our love may be withdrawn.

   Love, as God loves us, doesn’t work that way, it is never withdrawn.  Throughout history, we have repeatedly abandoned God’s ways and gone astray.  We see this clearly in the history of God’s chosen people, the Israelites.  However, it not just the Jewish people but all of us who refuse to follow God’s will.  Still, His love remains and will never depart from us.

   Jesus gives Himself to us completely.  He gives Himself to us in His eternal love, and in his endless mercy.  He even gives us His own Body and Blood in Holy Communion.  He wants us to possess Him, to have Him within us.  He wants to possess us and make us His own.  That's what it means to love; to be one with the other, to want nothing but good for them.

   There is no greater gift that we can give than that of our love.  When given completely, as it is supposed to be, it is the only thing that matters. 

Lord, You love us eternally.

You want us for Your own.

Teach us to love as You do.

To have You within us always. 

Amen