Talking Tuesday: "It is Good That You Exist"

(Rio Grande, U.S. Parks Service)

I'm in the middle of Ulrich L. Lehner's excellent book called God is Not Nice: Rejecting Pop Theology and Discovering the God Worth Living For.  I started reading it as research for the novel, but I'm finding so much good in it personally.  I've taken extensive notes on the book, and I find myself thinking about various passages at odd moments.  One that stood out to me a few days ago was a short analysis of what love is, and how that relates to God.

"In order to love, we have to know what love is, or at least get a better understanding of its nature.  Aristotle gives us a famous definition of love in his Rhetoric: "Let loving, then be defined as wishing for anyone the things which we believe to be good, for his sake but not for our own."  He reminds us that often what we believe is love toward our neighbors or enemies is in reality egotistical affection.  If we wish somebody well because we fear that if she is doing badly she might turn on us, our wish was centered on us and not the other person.

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[But Aristotle does not go far enough in his definition]. I think therefore, that Pieper's more basic understanding of love as saying yes to the existence of another person, stating "It's good that you exist," is a more powerful summary than Aristole's of what love in a Christian context can mean.  When we confirm that it is good that somebody exists, even our greatest enemy, we confirm simultaneously that God has a plan for this person, and we realize that we will be able to turn our aggression and ill will into wishing her God's blessing.  Growing in love transforms the human person.

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By saying yes to the other, one answers to the value this person represents, and by doing so on participates in the gift of love.  Only when two lovers exchange an unconditional yes to each other do they constitute a unity that transcends their earthly existence and participates in the mystery of the divine life.  The result of the complete self-surrender to each other is joy, but it is an effect that comes unintended.  It has to be unintended, because if I desired something else besides the beloved--for example, joy--I would be using my beloved to fulfill my needs!"

~Ulrich Lehner, God is Not Nice. Notre Dame: Ave Maria Press, 2017, pp 73-74.

"It is good that you exist"--this is such an interesting meditation on what it means to love another person.  To want their happiness and well-being above your own needs and wants, to pray for their salvation above your own.  The chapter is called The God of Surrender, and I've thought a lot lately about what that means.  To surrender my own wants and wishes, to give up my idols and ideals, to stop bargaining with God, to just take what is and go from there.  It is a hard thing, to do that, every moment of every day.  We are all profoundly selfish human beings after all, and our culture encourages us to wish the complete annihilation of our enemies.  To do the opposite--to wish for the prosperity and salvation of our enemies, to not only forgive, but to think good thoughts about those who have wronged us, to remain in friendship, these are all difficult, wild things.

But then, we don't serve a tame, predictable God.  We serve a wild God, one who is, in the words of C.S. Lewis, "not safe, but very good."