During the High Middle Ages,
Troubadour poetry composed primarily in southern Europe included themes
including of courtly love, which became associated with marriage. Before then,
that institution was associated mostly with property and progeny rather than
with romantic love. Interestingly, it was just as love was becoming associated
with marriage when the Roman Catholic Church ended its centuries-old
gay-marriage liturgy, which, sans property and progeny, was uniquely associated
with love (for why else would gays marry?). The irony is that “modern” gay
marriage in the West in the twenty-first century may have more to do with sex
than love in the sex-centric gay culture, though obviously gays are fully
capable of genuine love that transcends such superficialities as lust,
especially squalid lust that is distended in “open” relationships sans
commitment. Indeed, married gays in loving, committed relationships even raise
children in loving homes. Although utterly obscene to more conservative folks,
such “mixed families” grounded in love warrant respect and even admiration for
being based in genuine love, whereas the sex-centric approach to “relationships”
in the gay “culture” justly warrants condemnation for being superficial,
short-sighted, and utterly self-centered. Yet, whether gay or heterosexual, romantic
love need not be selfish. The distinction in Christian theology between caritas
and agape is relevant in making this point.
Augustine adopted the notion
of caritas love from Plato’s eros (lust)-sourced love that can be
directed upward, or sublimated, to eternal moral verities. Augustine replaced
those with the Christian deity as the object of eros-fueled passionate love. “I
pine for your scent,” Augustine writes in reference to God in Confessions.
Such love “comes from below” in that it is based in human nature, yet when
aimed to a high object, this kind of Christian love is rendered salubrious, yet
not at all divorced from self-love. Eros is a clutching in a desire of
attachment, after all. In contrast, the Christian love known as agape refers
to God’s self-emptying love for humanity. This utterly selfless love is epitomized
by the Incarnation in which God lowers itself to manifest in human flesh (i.e.,
Jesus). This sort of love is not at all of clutching or attaching; rather, agape
is self-giving.
Genuine human love, even in
the context of romantic love, can take after agape love rather than
merely caritas. To be sure, it is not easy to practice such divine-sourced
love in the context of romantic attachment. The heavy presence of selfishness
is evinced in romance by efforts to control the beloved even in fits of
jealousy. Monogamy in this sense is arguably more toxic than are open-relationships,
unless the sex outside of the relationship involves connections (i.e., other
loves) that are extrinsic to the couple, for the cost to the relationship in
terms of foregone emotional intimacy is very great in such cases. My point is
that egoism is alive and well in romantic love. I contend that couples can get
beyond such an orientation of self-centric attachment and thereby introduce
some agape-like love, which is not based on eros.
Looking out for the best
interests of the beloved even at one’s own expense can be thought of as genuine
rather than romantic interpersonal love. If, for example, in dating another
person the affection is not mutual and the beloved is more taken with another
person, then recommending that he or she be with that person rather than
oneself even though this goes against one’s self-interest qualifies as genuine,
mature love that does not reduce to one’s own self-interest (e.g., attachment).
Similarly, if the beloved’s values are different, then recommending that he or
she be with someone who shares those values is also in the interests of the
beloved even though the temptation might be to convince the beloved to adopt
one’s own values. The latter is obviously in line with one’s own self-interest,
even though trying to change a person is ultimately short-sighted and perhaps
even foolish.
How then can a person more easily apply agape within the context of romance? One way is by practicing the preachment of Jesus of the Gospels that inconvenient compassion is the way into the kingdom of God. Known as “love thy enemies,” this love, which I contend is spiritually more powerful than neighbor-love (benevolentia universalis), is applied not just at the extreme to one’s enemies, but also one’s detractors and even people who have simply but annoyingly been rude. Responding in compassion to their humanity—their human, physical and emotional needs—bypasses one’s ego, which would prefer to tell such people to go to hell. Practicing precisely this sort of compassion is I believe what Jesus preaches in the Gospels as the Way into the kingdom of God. As a byproduct, such a practice makes it easier to recommend to a beloved that he or she couple with another person if that one is better for the beloved (or more loved by the beloved!) even though you want the beloved for yourself. Unrequited love need not be inconsistent with inconvenient compassion and in fact can be an opportunity to exercise it, and thereby get a whiff of the kingdom of God. What a contrast to sex-centric “relationships”!
