Beyond romantic love…

Far too many people have an excessive focus on sensuality.

One mistake is going too early into romantic love, where one is overwhelmed by powerful feelings toward the other. Another error is being obsessed with maintaining your emotional and sexual thrills, as if romance should be a never-ending sugar high.

Romantic love is fickle because our emotions are fickle (like tinder): it creates a spark but does not sustain a fire.

John Paul II's Love and Responsibility offers an antidote to this shallow view. He explains that your relationship must not stay at the level of mere infatuation. It must develop into a true friendship and betrothed love, which is deeper, involving total and sacrificial surrender of oneself to the other.

This kind of love brings long-lasting fulfillment, like a generous bonfire burning through a log.

Love by its very nature is diffusive, which means going out of yourself with a generous spirit. Think of Jesus on the cross who shed every last drop of blood in his body. He poured it all out! Didn’t leave a single drop to himself. He never sought to preserve himself as we do so selfishly in our every interaction.

The model for sexuality is not the culture, but the Trinity. Couples who understand this experience not just the love of their spouse but enter into the highest form of love: Trinitarian love. There is a total flow of love within the Trinity; unreserved self-giving. The Father eternally begets the Son, the Son eternally returns this love to the Father, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from this perfect exchange of love.

So don’t settle for little sparks of feelings when you were made for a blazing fire!

“Ok, Frank. But how do I imitate this impossible love?”

Begin with little Thérèse’s advice: ‘When one loves, one does not calculate.’

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