Made for love

I urge you to continue your apostolate with joy and to be a sign of a love that embraces everyone, as the #GospelOfTheDay suggests. May we transform evil into goodness and build a fraternal world. Do not be afraid to take risks for love! 

The daily tweets from Pope Francis' account understandably paused after he went into Gemelli Hospital on the 14th, apart from a short message of gratitude for the prayer and affection with which he was being accompanied. But on Sunday, after a week's silence, the above words were shared, as a reflection on Jesus' call to radical, forgiving, non-selective love in Luke 6: 27-38, the very timely Gospel for Sunday's Mass. Love your enemies, do good to them, bless and pray for those who harm you, is as tough as loving can ever get. Loving - genuinely - those who have undermined us; being kind and courteous to those who have been aggressive; praying for those who speak badly about us... Yes; that's tough. 

But it is, of course, what we were made for! We were made for love; created to love. Nothing less; nothing else... unless you count compassion, forgiveness, kindness, and all the other things which flow from love.

All of which brings me back to a few lines in Dilexit nos, Pope Francis' recent encyclical on the love of the Heart of Jesus. In paragraphs 21 and 23 he writes:

Everything finds its unity in the heart, which can be the dwelling-place of love in all its spiritual, psychic and even physical dimensions. In a word, if love reigns in our heart, we become, in a complete and luminous way, the persons we are meant to be, for every human being is created above all else for love. In the deepest fibre of our being, we were made to love and to be loved...

Whenever a person thinks, questions and reflects on his or her true identity, strives to understand the deeper questions of life and to seek God, or experiences the thrill of catching a glimpse of truth, it leads to the realisation that our fulfilment as human beings is found in love. In loving, we sense that we come to know the purpose and goal of our existence in this world...

It can be tough to truly love; it can also be tough to resist being sucked into the anger, rudeness and loathing we see around us, whether on social media or in public life. But anger and loathing are not the purpose and goal of our existence; they are not what we were made for. We were made to love, and to be loved. May we always aim to live and speak and act from that fundamental, primordial purpose and call.