“He who loves Me, says the Lord, will keep My commandments (cf. John 14:15, 23); and ‘this is My commandment, that you love one another’ (John 15:12). Thus he who does not love his neighbor fails to keep the commandment, and so cannot love the Lord.”
St. Maximos the Confessor
Four Hundred Texts on Love
The PhilokaliaVolume 2
According to the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, love is the work God calls us to do which he highlighted in his sermon for the royal wedding. I also realize that some are uncomfortable with the comments Bishop Curry shared in his sermon because they see it as an oversimplification of what God expects us to do and opens too many doors to let all people in. The beauty in these two realities is the fact that love has the power to make us collide with our own conviction and, if only for a moment, wonder with each other about the power of this love we know from God. Love was a big part of the early church tradition and they were dealing with similar issues of social justice, politics and religion, and societal morals that almost mimic our life today. St. Maximos grounds much of his theology in the fourth Gospel and describes very bluntly the result of not loving our neighbors. For Maximos love goes beyond just relationship but trying to look at the entire welfare of the other. It is not simple, easy, or comfortable, but the reality is, as Bishop Curry states, there is power when we try. A God who loves his creation made us to love each other. We are all voluntary cogs in the beautiful, yet chaotic, machine of creation and when we lose sight of our priority to love the machine begins to bind up and fail to do what God intended it to do!
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