Do you love like a pagan?

Hint: Most Christians do without realizing it.

Good morning Caveman,

Imagine you lived your entire life inside a cave.

One day, you finally decide to step outside and observe the world.

Very quickly, you realize that in nature there are powers.

Some powers are stronger than others.

Like the LION.

Yes Frank, it eats all the other animals, and none are above it.

Ouch. yeah. Don't get near a lion.

Anyways, Frank learns that the lion gets hungry. And when it does, it wants to eat him.

So, he learns to fear it.

To avoid becoming the lion’s next meal, Frank brings it food. A rabbit today, another tomorrow.

Feeding the creature becomes a ritual offering. A sacrifice.

Frank hopes that by giving something valuable, this greater power will spare him.

In consequence, he has developed a relationship with the Lion. But it is a relationship of fear from being eaten.

This way of thinking shaped much of the ancient world. Pagan people offered sacrifices to their gods to appease their anger.

Many pagans worshipped the Sun, seeing it as above even the lion.

They burnt animal offerings so that the ashes would rise to the Sun’s mouth. If the Sun was fed, perhaps it would have mercy and grant them crops.

And when the pagans ran out of animals to sacrifice, or when they thought the gods were angry (such as during dry season and famine), they sacrificed something infinitely more valuable:

their. own. children.

That fear didn’t disappear when Christianity began and many Christians still have this view of God.

They think God is this angry old powerful man, sitting above, looking down to find a mistake to burn them alive in Hell.

But the God of Israel revealed something completely different.

When God called Abraham, He began to teach humanity that He is not like the pagan gods: He does not need us, nor does he benefit from our gifts.

In fact, when Abraham was about to offer his son (Genesis 22), God stopped him and provided a lamb instead.

For the first time in human history, the higher power said: stop. I don’t want your son. Here is mine.

Ouf.

So the first error we make is thinking God created us to feed Him.

But there’s another side to the same coin, another error we commit, which is a natural progression of the first.

If your relationship with God is about “feeding” Him to get your needs met (like a transactional exchange at the supermarket), you will inevitably act the same way with others you “love”:

NO FRANK.

IT’S THE OPPOSITE.

Love gives itself! Love pours itself out, as a gift! It doesn’t consume the other.

You see, both Frank and the pagans think that love is something we take.

Two sides of the same error: the pagan sun asking to be fed, and Frank eating his date.

But the Christian God said that true love is neither of these.

To prove it, He comes to you.

…

Frank just got a kiss… from God?

Yes.

You see, when you go to Mass, you do not go to feed God.

He doesn’t need to be fed. But you do.

So He comes down, makes Himself a sacrifice, and offers Himself to feed you.

Open wide your mouth.

Frank, you cannot “eat” your girlfriend. But you can eat God without exhausting him. This tells you that the desires you have in your heart, and your longing for love, were not made to be fulfilled by your girlfriend (or any gods of this world).

So if you are hungry for Love, it’s because you’ve been depriving yourself of Him and trying to feed the infinite ocean of your soul with finite buckets of pleasures.