First, you must have honest and noble intentions. You are so taken by her that you’d want to do everything right and everything good to capture her attention, to make her know you exist and that you are out to make this feeling you feel so enabling that you’d make her see, feel and in time, believe in you so that she’d reciprocate the feeling you feel and would want to live and grow old with you.
Whew! That’s a mouthful.
You cannot win by bribery, buying her everything her heart desires – clothes, jewelry, the good life – they won’t last;
By violence – threatening, frightening, hurting her to submission or pirating her away by force;
By deceit – you lie. Everything you do and say is contrived and put on;
By drama – using full theatrics, bells, whistles, thunder and lightning to floor her. You razzle-dazzle her telling her that she had cast a spell on you luring even the sun, the moon and the stars to blaze a blinding trail to where you are;
You can’t pressure her either. You need to make her feel and think of you in a ‘true love’ fashion where your anxious heart waits for her call and command.
What then must you do?
You sacrifice. Even if it breaks down your spirit, a toll on your brain and brawn, you give up your time to be with her.
When she’s happy, you are happy. When she laughs, you can’t help but also laugh. You want to share everything that’s calm and beautiful. Anything that puts a glisten in her eyes and a smile on her face. You want to sweep her in your arms and trip the light fantastic. You are so captivated and inspired that your heart bursts out in songs of longing and praise.
When she’s worried, you worry. When she’s safe, you feel content and you sleep long. You always want to protect her. There is nothing in the world that you won’t do to keep her well and at peace.
Your heart is filled with trust, compassion, generosity and gratefulness.
If you succeed and she becomes your wife, it doesn’t stop there. True love expects, nah, demands, that you continue this devoted and persistent attention every day.
If you argue, if you fight, if you have words with her and make her cry, you are restless until she is once again in your arms, snuggling and warm; her heart flowing with so much joy that she shouts to high heavens, “He loves me.”
“And, I love her,” you affirm.
Love brings out the best in you. But, be on guard. Don’t let anything fool or blind you to become selfish and greedy. What is the one rule of thumb? Do everything with love. If it’s not for love, it destroys and it kills, because your prime motive becomes self-centered, to benefit yourself and your ego.
This is love on a human perspective.
What about God? How does He love us?
He fulfills every criterion of undying love. He indulges us, protects us, celebrates, sings and dances with us. Most of all, He sacrificed.
By giving up His only child, he secured and guaranteed a life teeming of happiness and abundance that will never end.
When we hurt and push Him away, He always makes the first move to breach the chasm.
One song celebrates God’s immeasurable love for us: God is everywhere. He is in the break of a new dawn, in the pouring rain, in the scent of early morn, in the glow of the moon, in a babbling, chattering brook, in the blue haze of fluffy clouds, in the warmth of tiny hands holding you tight, in the hope of the broken, in the laugh of a friend, in the soft lullaby of a mother, in the dream of a lost child, in the strength of the tireless man, and in the sweet sigh of lovers.
Even if we turn our back on Him, He waits, He lingers. Patiently. No matter where we go, He is there and prods us softly that His heart can only rest when we’re back in it again.
This is what makes God happy.
If we’ve gone back to God, should we not bring those we love back to Him, too?
For those who are lost, desperate, misunderstood, those who are wandering and wallowing in stormy seas and self-pity, stuck and struggling out of the mire, in sin and in hate, let us help God find them.
“Come back, you belong here with me,” God says.
We do, dear God, we do. Show us the way and never give up on us. Amen.
Santuario de San Antonio Parish 