WE NEED NOT LIVE AN ANETHETISED LIFE

Just last Friday, Michael Leunig passed away. Many mourn him since he enriched us all by revealing us to ourselves. Particularly was his mission apt at showing us the value of being human and vulnerable when there is so much pressure to appear in control and aggressive. A well-known politician wrote a book entitled, ‘Whatever It Takes,’ that to any sensitive soul reveals itself as survival of the fittest mentality at the heart of politics and social un-love.

Love is not just romance, hugs or sex. Its more redeeming expression is treating others and ourselves as human beings rather than entities, obstacles and means to our own ends.

The truth that God is love is much more than a pious assertion. It means that love is the most important thing in life. But more than this, it means that love is Jesus Christ being who He is, what He did and who we are as a result of His being love.

I have been watching ‘Bones’ on Disney+. The crux of the story of the forensic anthropologist and the FBI agent is will they fall in love?’(which they eventually do and have kids) The story also revolves around the personal issues and relationship of the scientists in the forensic lab - who in their own way are all representations of us in their facets of ‘being a self’.

I find myself deeply moved every time someone exhibits any form of such love in their work/social situation. What ‘form of love’ might this be? Simply and deeply, it is treating others as the human beings that they are. The unique humanity of each is what Richard Rohr calls The Immortal Diamond. This is none other than the expression of God in His daughters and sons.

Before my brother Ron died recently I shared with him what I had seen in an episode of ‘Back Roads' on ABC iView.  Eugowra had been devastated by a freak flood that drowned houses and businesses in the town from a flooding creek that had never flooded like that before. The episode showed the town recovering from the devastation. I observed people loving on a large scale by cleaning and hosing out silt and stench. They were loving each other.  I said to Ron, ‘Love is everything’ to which he agreed with gusto.  There is a lot of love about and it’s not just the province of church folks.

Christ in us is the power to undo the dehumanisation that forms much of our culture. Real love is living to be your true self and facilitating others to be who they are. This releases new creation life - Christ come in us -the Kingdom of Jesus realised in the Everyday.

Thomas Torrance wrote, “Reconciliation is not a truth which revelation makes known to us; reconciliation is the truth of God himself who grants himself freely to us in his revelation. God who is the mighty, holy, eternal God, gave himself to us who are so impotent, so unholy, and mortal. Revelation is reconciliation, as certainly as it is God himself: God with us, God beside us, and chiefly and decisively God for us.” (1)

A keyway in which God loves us is Christ restoring to us our True Selves and giving us the ability from within our being to love self and others with genuine love. I have wondered at times - what comes first, love or life? I think love comes first because love is the reason God is excited to share His life with us.
 
(1)Torrance, Thomas F.. The Christian Doctrine of God, One Being Three Persons (T&T Clark Cornerstones) (p. 33). Bloomsbury Publishing. Kindle Edition.