Loving A Hidden God
LOVE'S OBSTACLES
There is plenty of the wrong sort of love around. Indeed, very few people seem to have the right sort of love. There is a love that is useful and a love that does harm. Let bad love be eliminated by good love! Let the love that does harm be emptied out and the love that is of use take its place! People are so filled up with the bad that they can't absorb anything else. They must pour out the bad to make room for the good.
Sermon 368, 3
Intimate friendship with other human beings is indeed a precious good in this life, but there are many obstacles that must be overcome. Even when we find such a true love, there are still many pitfalls. Because we are "cracked" we humans have the facility to "mess" up even the best of our human loves by our extreme selfishness. It is natural for us to "love" our self. After all, our first obligation is to save our own soul. Augustine goes so far as to say that we cannot love God or other humans if we don't love ourselves in the right way (Sermon 368, 5), coming to value ourselves as reflections of God (83 Diverse Questions, 51, 2-3)
However, too much concentration on self impedes any true love of others. We become infected with what I would call a "life-rage", a rage that surges through our spirit when anyone or anything impinges upon our "space". For example, we are overcome with "road-rage" when another driver cuts us off on the highway. We feel "supermarket rage" when a shopper blocks our "right-of-way" with an unattended cart or uncontrolled kid. Now that I am older and slower I sometimes feel rage welling up inside me when the young rush by on the narrow campus walks, oblivious of my presence, sometimes brushing against me as they gabble together, obviously more interested in each other than in me. Over time I have come to realize that this is but an aspect of a more general rage, a "geezer rage" at their being young and vigorous while I am old and doddering.
Now retired, I feel rage when others don't seem to remember the work I have done, perhaps angry because I sadly know I am incapable of doing such work any more. I even have "noise-rage" when there is loud talking outside my door. In families siblings fight each other for touching their toys or telling secrets about each other's lives. Spouses are angry when the love of their life (because of children or old friends) no longer seem to bestow undivided affection on them. In one way or another we become envious or jealous or angry when others seem to be nibbling away at what we have come to believe is rightfully ours. In some way or other we feel that our lives have been lessened and we experience a "life-rage", infuriated when others collide with our lives.
It is obvious that such "life-rage" delivers a death-blow to the possibility of being friends with others. Such attention to self is the root of a destructive pride whereby you believe that you are better that everyone else, that you stand on the pinnacle of the mountain while others live out their lives in the mediocrity of the valley below. You are enraged when others do not seem to recognize your superiority. You, the self-proclaimed philosopher king, are infuriated by the abject dumbness of those around you. Love them? They are lucky that you do not sweep them out of your way!
Sometimes the impediment that stands in the way of our loving others is that we are not loving them in the right way. Love is desire for another but sometimes that desire can become self-destructive. For example, true love for another cannot exist ...
1. when we desire another as an object of pleasure who is desired only because they satisfy our physical or emotional needs.
2. when we desire another as someone to dominate, someone whom we can treat as a slave in order to prove to the skeptical world that we are indeed a superior creation.
3. when we desire another as a trophy or possession to be displayed at certain times to an appreciative crowd who may wonder how such an extraordinary ornament could be possessed by such "ordinary" clods.
4. when we desire another so obsessively that we rob them of their freedom. In life you never let them out of your sight. In the face of their death, you will not let them die in peace. Augustine gives the example of the young son who keeps his elderly father awake lest he die, despite the father's protestations that he wants to sleep, that he wants to die. (Sermon 400, 12) Burdened by such obsessive love, you may experience a "death-rage" when your loved one finally dies. It is not that you have not loved. If anything, you have loved too ardently, denying your beloved a life (even an eternal life) of their own.
Even when we finally find true love there are impediments that can weaken it or even destroy it. Two such are envy and jealousy. Both can eviscerate even the best of friendships. Indeed, as the story of Cain and Abel shows, they can even lead to murder. Augustine makes an distinction between the different ways in which envy and jealousy warp our love. When we are envious of another's goodness we may not particularly want that goodness for ourselves. Being envious of another's life does not mean that we would want that life for ourselves. Cain killed his brother not because he wanted to take over his life as a shepherd. He was envious of Abel's goodness simply because he was good. (City of God, 15.5)
On the other hand, envy can be caused by the perception that the other person is not good, or at least not good enough to merit the benefit bestowed on them. Thus, sometimes we become envious of another who is honored for inconsequential accomplishment or is promoted to a job that we deem beyond their capacity. I may not want to be president of this organization myself, but I cannot stand the incompetent who has been chosen to lead it. I say to myself (and perhaps to others):
How can they give that award to that drone! How can that idiot get that promotion! I would not want such things for myself, but certainly they don't deserve them!
As Augustine notes, the only cure for such envy is a spirit of tolerant acceptance of the mysterious providence of God that saves sinners and the vagaries of human decision-makers that sometimes cause undeserving people to receive recognition far beyond their performance. (Commentary on the Letter to the Galatians, # 52)
It is obvious that such envy must stand in the way of friendly love for another. Indeed, as Augustine observes:
... nothing is more opposed to love than envy.
Catechizing the Uninstructed, 4.8
The reason is simple. The perfection of love is the love of beneficence, a love which only wishes good for another because of the goodness that you see in them. In one form of envy (that which infected Cain), it is precisely that good which is hated. You don't desire the benefit bestowed on them for yourself; you just don't want them to receive it! This is the envy Augustine refers to when he asks:
What is envy, but hatred of another's happiness? Malice takes delight in another person's ills; envy is tormented even by another person's well-being.
Sermon 353, 1.
Jealousy is slightly different from such envy, though its effect on love is the same. When you are envious you are upset by the good in another simply because it is there. You don't particularly want it for yourself. When you are jealous of another, you see them receiving a good which you want exclusively for yourself. Thus, two lovers may become jealous of any other loving relationship that their beloved may have. A jealous spouse is upset by any love not directed at themselves. They get angry when their partner is concerned about relatives, when they go out on the town with old friends, when the persistent demand of children takes away the attention they believe should be showered on them. The jealous person seems to believe that love is a commodity that is destroyed by use, not (as Augustine insists) something that is increased only by being shared with many others. (Commentary on the Letter to the Galatians, # 52)
Such jealousy is destructive of love because at its root is a lack of trust, that quality which is so essential for a true love of friendship. If our love is infected by a suspicion that our beloved is not totally committed to us, that their "sharing of hearts" with others somehow or other diminishes the share of their hearts that we have, then trust must die, Indeed, we may even begin to consider them as "the enemy" because we think that they have betrayed us by innocently loving another.
Love may also be impeded by an avarice whereby a person becomes more interested in acquiring more and more things than in giving and receiving affection. As Augustine warns, though money is not a bad thing ...
... if you let your heart be captured by love of money you are heaping up many sorrows for yourself. Avarice enslaves you; only love can make you free.
Sermon 167, 3
For the acquisitive person, careers become more important than family; the way family funds are spent becomes more important than nourishing an always fragile loving relationship. Disputes about money are frequently the cause of an anger & quarreling where the loving partners become unable to agree on a common point of view especially regarding the acquisition and spending of money. Quickly the sharing of hearts dissolves into a controversy over "who gets what" and the principle of supposedly loving union becomes: "I got mine!" and there is no "ours". Through such conflict and anger over "things" the first step is taken towards hatred, the direct opposite of friendly love.
Augustine maintained that there is not much we can do to eliminate anger from our lives just now. (Sermon 211, 1) Our "cracked" condition and our infinite thirst for "good" sets the scene for the "life-rage" mentioned above. In this imperfect life we can never get all the good things that we desire. We cannot get those we love to love us in return. We cannot get those who do love us to love us with an exclusive love where we alone are the objects of their affection. And, when we do not get what we want, we become angry.
Augustine believed that the two powerful passions that affect us now, lust and anger, did not exist in Eden. Humans certainly had sexual desire and they did have differences of opinion but both of these were expressed in a rational, calm way. But, as Augustine remarks:
It is different now. Even people who live a life of moral and religious self-control need to rein in these passions. This may be easy or difficult, but the bit and bridle are always needed.
City of God, 14.19
As a result of our imperfect condition, anger cannot be eliminated, it can only be controlled. (Sermon 315, 7.10)
In truth, because this world is imperfect, there is frequently just cause for anger when we see the evil inflicted on the innocent, when we see the evil and stupid things we ourselves sometimes do. To be in love does not lessen the chance of losing our temper. At times anger will "well up" even against those we love most dearly. All we can do is to try not to act on it, try not to nourish it. People talk about becoming a "prisoner of love" but we also can become a "prisoner of our anger". As Augustine warned his listeners:
People who hate others walk about and come and go as they he please. They are bound by no chains. They are not physically confined to a prison cell. And yet they are bound by their guilty state. I don't want you to think that those who are angry are not imprisoned. Their prison is their heart.
Sermon 211, 2
Worse still, anger that is nourished over time will begin to fester and become hatred. As Augustine describes the process:
Anger is the straw; hatred is the beam. When you nourish the straw, it is made a beam. Anger permitted to age becomes hatred; the straw becomes the beam.
Sermon 49, 7
And again:
We do not yet hate those with whom we begin to be angry. But if that anger should remain and not quickly be expelled, it will grow old and become hatred.
Commentary on Psalm 30, 4
Such hatred is the ultimate impediment to loving humans or God. Hatred of God is what imprisons Satan in hell. Hatred of others makes real in us the somber declaration of Sartre that "hell is other people". (Huis Clos, [In Camera] Paris 1945) Hatred is a darkness that completely eliminates the illumination that true love brings into our lives. (Commentary on Psalm 54, 8)
If hatred is unexpressed, it does no harm to the one we hate but it still gradually destroys ourselves. (Confessions, 1.18.28) We become an enemy to ourselves. (Sermon 82, 3) and gradually narrow our lives. (Commentary on Psalm 134, 1) We turn back upon ourselves, hugging our angry hatred more and more tightly until our spirit dies of self-strangulation. As Augustine declares:
Love is our life. If love is life, then hatred is death. Someone in a fit of rage may kill another's body; but when you hold onto hatred, you kill your own soul. He kills a body; you kill your spirit.
Commentary on Psalm 54, 7
What he is saying is that our uncontrolled "life-rage", our antipathy towards anyone sharing in or interfering in our lives will eventually kill our soul.
We must be aware of our tendency towards such "life-rage" and its deleterious effect on our lives and loves. It is only by love of others, even those who seem to be enemies, that we can overcome the swirling tides of our times. (Commentary on Psalm 54, 5)