Quick post tonight, as I am trying very hard to adjust to the new morning routine of a family with school children and must to get to bed soon. Dark thirty comes awful early.
Anna started school on Tuesday. She rode the bus her first day, and true to form, she did not look back once when she got on. The fingers of her future gripped my heart as the bus pulled away. I got the distinct sense that, if I blinked, I would open my eyes to see her driving off in her honeymoon limo. Gratefully, time is suspended and I haven't opened my eyes yet.
Noah was a bit lost without his sister that morning, and so was I. He offered twice to go pick her up before school was even out. We baked cookies to pass the time. And watched Spongebob. Because I'm just that kinda mom.
The next day, on Wednesday, tornadoes hit our area right before 3:00, and my poor girl had to endure a tornado drill on her second day of school! All of the kids were fine, but the report from the front lines came back that, after a few minutes, she refused to stay in the turtle position. I guess she figured that, if it hadn't gotten her by then, it wasn't going to! No, there's no use in conjecture. That's just who she is. I love her for it.
Finally, she tells me that school is a lot of fun, and she really likes going every day. There is a "cute boy" named Matthew who seems to come up in quite a few conversations now. She also "made an alliance" with Benjamin and Olivia (pretty sure I didn't know what an alliance was in kindergarten) but this alliance has apparently been abandoned because they all decided to "just be friends." I am sore afraid.
I have a feeling that Anna will give me enough material to keep all seven of you entertained for the next 8 months! Probably for the next 13 years.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Saturday, August 15, 2009
It can only get better from here
So we got Anna registered for school last week ... it was "the worst day of her life."
I know this because she declared it when she arrived at her new school, her father and brother in tow, to meet me for registration. I was filling out forms in the school office, and she plopped down in the chair in front of me and declared for the room's benefit: "This is the WORST day of my LIFE."
"Why is this the worst day of your life?" I asked, wholly amused.
"Because you are making me go to SCHOOL."
"But you are going to love school!" her dad says, in a tone that betrays the hint that he has told her this more than once already.
"Well, honey," I said, "the great news is that, if today is the worst day of your life, then it's all downhill from here. It's never going to be this bad again, and every day from now on will be better than this!"
She glowered at me. "I do NOT see it that way!" she declared. And I shared a peripheral smile with the school secretary.
Anna starts kindergarten on Tuesday. I simply can't believe my little girl will be going to school all day every day. We have visited her classroom, met her teacher, met a few classmates, and gathered all the school supplies. Today she and I are going shopping to pick out her "first day of school" outfit. I think she may be a little stressed about the changes; I think her mother is going to lose it when she drops her off at school for the first time.
My baby is growing up so fast! She is so beautiful, so intelligent, so funny, so dramatic, so vulnerable, so sweet, so crafty, so sassy, so wonderful ... I have no doubt that she is only going to be more and more fun as the years go on. But I have to admit that I will always miss this time, when she was little.
I tell her this every once in awhile, like when I smile at her and say, "Why do you keep growing up? Why won't you stay little forever?" She inevitably rolls her eyes and says the same thing every time: "I can't help it, Mom, but I'll always be your daughter."
I know this because she declared it when she arrived at her new school, her father and brother in tow, to meet me for registration. I was filling out forms in the school office, and she plopped down in the chair in front of me and declared for the room's benefit: "This is the WORST day of my LIFE."
"Why is this the worst day of your life?" I asked, wholly amused.
"Because you are making me go to SCHOOL."
"But you are going to love school!" her dad says, in a tone that betrays the hint that he has told her this more than once already.
"Well, honey," I said, "the great news is that, if today is the worst day of your life, then it's all downhill from here. It's never going to be this bad again, and every day from now on will be better than this!"
She glowered at me. "I do NOT see it that way!" she declared. And I shared a peripheral smile with the school secretary.
Anna starts kindergarten on Tuesday. I simply can't believe my little girl will be going to school all day every day. We have visited her classroom, met her teacher, met a few classmates, and gathered all the school supplies. Today she and I are going shopping to pick out her "first day of school" outfit. I think she may be a little stressed about the changes; I think her mother is going to lose it when she drops her off at school for the first time.
My baby is growing up so fast! She is so beautiful, so intelligent, so funny, so dramatic, so vulnerable, so sweet, so crafty, so sassy, so wonderful ... I have no doubt that she is only going to be more and more fun as the years go on. But I have to admit that I will always miss this time, when she was little.
I tell her this every once in awhile, like when I smile at her and say, "Why do you keep growing up? Why won't you stay little forever?" She inevitably rolls her eyes and says the same thing every time: "I can't help it, Mom, but I'll always be your daughter."
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Never say goodbye
One of the great lights of my life is Chris.
Chris is my dad's cousin. She is a beautiful fun woman with a head of thick dark hair and rich full laugh. Heavens, what a laugh she has! Her smile and laughter fill every corner of a room. If something tickles her, she just rears back her head and roars, and everyone makes her laugh. She enjoys life and her life is infectious.
When I was a little girl, I remember spending the night with her at her house. She would take me shopping and out to eat, then we would come home and listen to Barry Manilow records. My love for Barry Manilow probably has more to do with Chris than with Barry. Listening to his music was as much about being connected to her as it was enjoying his songs. Before going to bed at night, Chris would ask me what record I wanted to listen to and what side. I would chose very carefully (did I want to hear the live version of "Copacabana" over and over, or was I more interested in the studio recording of "One Voice?"). She would put the vinyl down on the turntable, set the volume low, and soon she would be asleep. I would lay awake, watching the arm reset itself to the beginning of the record over and over, never tiring of hearing the same five songs in succession while Chris snored softly beside me. I was safe and felt loved.
I remember the last time I spent the night at her house when I was seven. She picked me up, her head covered in a scarf tied behind her head, instead of her usual crown of thick dark hair. I noticed but never asked why. We went to eat, then went to her house. She put a copy of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas in her BETA player and I silently had an anxiety attack. Omygoodness, this movie has the word "whore" in the title and it has a big red R rating on the front of the box. I protested meekly, telling her that I am not allowed to watch rated R movies. She brushed it off. "Oh, it's not bad. Your dad won't know. It has good music," she said. Oh, the anxiety that rolled through my stomach while that movie was on! I was convinced that, somehow, my father knew - he knew what I was doing! I was watching a rated R movie! - and I could not enjoy it. To this day I cannot remember the plot, the music, or anything besides Dolly Parton's boobs and Burt Reynold's hat, and I've never been able to bring myself to watch it since. I just kept waiting until we went to bed, so that I could listen to Barry Manilow and fall asleep next to Chris.
At bedtime, I climbed into Chris's bed while she got ready in the bathroom. When she came out, the scarf was gone. So was her hair. I couldn't help but stare. She simply smiled and said nothing. I didn't ask. The other thing that was different that night was that Chris didn't ask me what record I wanted to listen to. She didn't put one on, she just turned out the light. I don't know why I didn't ask her if we could put one on except that I was an incredibly meek child and could not reconcile what had happened to her head. The silence kept me awake that night.
The next morning, Chris took me to my grandmother's (her aunt's) house. We went inside, then Chris went to her car. When she came back in the house, her arms were carrying a huge stack of records and four songbooks. All of her Barry Manilow records! Four big books full of Barry Manilow songs lyrics! I couldn't believe it! She was giving them all to me! I was so excited and declared for Chris and Grandma that "Daybreak" was my very favorite song. I immediately began to read the songbooks from cover to cover, not paying any attention to any conversation the women may have been having right beside me.
Not long after, Grandma picked me up from home and said, "We're going to go visit Chris," I was so excited. Chris was my favorite. We didn't go to her house, though. We went to Memorial Medical Center. That anxiety was back, sitting in my stomach like realization, and I remembered Chris's head. I held Grandma's hand as she walked me into the hospital room where Chris was staying. I have absolutely no further recollection of my visit with Chris in the hospital.
One day, my dad picked me up from school. He waited until we were in the car before he quietly said, "Honey, I have something to tell you. Chris died today."
At this moment, I feel like I am back in the front seat of that Chevy Impala wagon, my father next to me, my Chris gone forever. He answered all of my questions as we drove home to my new life without her. Chris had breast cancer, he explained. What is cancer? Cancer is a disease of bad body cells that attack good body cells. Her body fought the cancer as hard as it could, but the cancer had gotten too strong. Her body was too weak from growing the baby within her and fighting the cancer for so long. Is the baby still alive? No, the baby was too little. The baby died too.
I never even knew she was going to have a baby.
____
I tell you that to tell you this: if I could have my ideal life, the ONLY thing I would change is that all of my loved ones, past and present, would still be right here with me. No one would ever leave, no one would ever die, and no love discovered would ever go away.
Now, the true art of life is in the acceptance of it. I believe this is true from two perspectives. The first is a vertical perspective. Life, as it is, can either be accepted or changed. If it is not accepted, it must be changed. If it cannot be changed, then it must be accepted. I cannot control uncontrollable cancer. I cannot control other people's choices. I cannot control the passage of time, the realization of truth, the inevitably directions we must all go in to grow. Some of us are blessed to walk together; some roads converge only to reach an inevitable fork where we wish the other well and go on. I accept this wholeheartedly now, but it is not without a touch of grief. I love the people I love, and I want them in my life always. It just is what it is. It's who I am.
In the midst of this acceptance, I acknowledge the grace and strength of this love that spurs me on to change what I can. I learn from mistakes, I embrace my memories, and I never let go of the love that I have. I have changed the way I grieve broken relationships. Now I rejoice for the connections, I recognize how each loved one has positively impacted my life, and I praise God for the chance to love at all. I take Chris with me wherever I go, as I do all of my loved ones. It is as if, in many ways, she is still here. All of that love is still here. That is the definition of a legacy.
The other perspective of the art of life is the horizontal one. Broken relationships serve to remind me, over and over, that this world is fallen and broken. Life will never be without pain; suffering is the singular experience that every human being throughout history has shared. It would take a miracle of seismic historic proportion to ever overcome it.
Thank God for the gospel! Thank Him that this miracle is alive. Christ has conquered death by death and by His resurrection, has restored life to all of us! We need only to accept this for our life to have HOPE, for the purpose of existence to become CLEAR, and for LOVE to be whole and real and life-giving and life-changing.
For I know that all that has been broken in this life will be made right. I know that this power is already at work, redeeming my own self and my short and limited interaction with life, and I do not have to wait for heaven to see His love at work on earth. I accept that this is what Life really is: to love God and cherish others, forever. So I give myself humbly, fully acknowledging how small and imperfect I am, as an agent of this Life-giving love.
And I find, as I consider these things, that I already have the life I have always wanted.
Chris is my dad's cousin. She is a beautiful fun woman with a head of thick dark hair and rich full laugh. Heavens, what a laugh she has! Her smile and laughter fill every corner of a room. If something tickles her, she just rears back her head and roars, and everyone makes her laugh. She enjoys life and her life is infectious.
When I was a little girl, I remember spending the night with her at her house. She would take me shopping and out to eat, then we would come home and listen to Barry Manilow records. My love for Barry Manilow probably has more to do with Chris than with Barry. Listening to his music was as much about being connected to her as it was enjoying his songs. Before going to bed at night, Chris would ask me what record I wanted to listen to and what side. I would chose very carefully (did I want to hear the live version of "Copacabana" over and over, or was I more interested in the studio recording of "One Voice?"). She would put the vinyl down on the turntable, set the volume low, and soon she would be asleep. I would lay awake, watching the arm reset itself to the beginning of the record over and over, never tiring of hearing the same five songs in succession while Chris snored softly beside me. I was safe and felt loved.
I remember the last time I spent the night at her house when I was seven. She picked me up, her head covered in a scarf tied behind her head, instead of her usual crown of thick dark hair. I noticed but never asked why. We went to eat, then went to her house. She put a copy of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas in her BETA player and I silently had an anxiety attack. Omygoodness, this movie has the word "whore" in the title and it has a big red R rating on the front of the box. I protested meekly, telling her that I am not allowed to watch rated R movies. She brushed it off. "Oh, it's not bad. Your dad won't know. It has good music," she said. Oh, the anxiety that rolled through my stomach while that movie was on! I was convinced that, somehow, my father knew - he knew what I was doing! I was watching a rated R movie! - and I could not enjoy it. To this day I cannot remember the plot, the music, or anything besides Dolly Parton's boobs and Burt Reynold's hat, and I've never been able to bring myself to watch it since. I just kept waiting until we went to bed, so that I could listen to Barry Manilow and fall asleep next to Chris.
At bedtime, I climbed into Chris's bed while she got ready in the bathroom. When she came out, the scarf was gone. So was her hair. I couldn't help but stare. She simply smiled and said nothing. I didn't ask. The other thing that was different that night was that Chris didn't ask me what record I wanted to listen to. She didn't put one on, she just turned out the light. I don't know why I didn't ask her if we could put one on except that I was an incredibly meek child and could not reconcile what had happened to her head. The silence kept me awake that night.
The next morning, Chris took me to my grandmother's (her aunt's) house. We went inside, then Chris went to her car. When she came back in the house, her arms were carrying a huge stack of records and four songbooks. All of her Barry Manilow records! Four big books full of Barry Manilow songs lyrics! I couldn't believe it! She was giving them all to me! I was so excited and declared for Chris and Grandma that "Daybreak" was my very favorite song. I immediately began to read the songbooks from cover to cover, not paying any attention to any conversation the women may have been having right beside me.
Not long after, Grandma picked me up from home and said, "We're going to go visit Chris," I was so excited. Chris was my favorite. We didn't go to her house, though. We went to Memorial Medical Center. That anxiety was back, sitting in my stomach like realization, and I remembered Chris's head. I held Grandma's hand as she walked me into the hospital room where Chris was staying. I have absolutely no further recollection of my visit with Chris in the hospital.
One day, my dad picked me up from school. He waited until we were in the car before he quietly said, "Honey, I have something to tell you. Chris died today."
At this moment, I feel like I am back in the front seat of that Chevy Impala wagon, my father next to me, my Chris gone forever. He answered all of my questions as we drove home to my new life without her. Chris had breast cancer, he explained. What is cancer? Cancer is a disease of bad body cells that attack good body cells. Her body fought the cancer as hard as it could, but the cancer had gotten too strong. Her body was too weak from growing the baby within her and fighting the cancer for so long. Is the baby still alive? No, the baby was too little. The baby died too.
I never even knew she was going to have a baby.
____
I tell you that to tell you this: if I could have my ideal life, the ONLY thing I would change is that all of my loved ones, past and present, would still be right here with me. No one would ever leave, no one would ever die, and no love discovered would ever go away.
Now, the true art of life is in the acceptance of it. I believe this is true from two perspectives. The first is a vertical perspective. Life, as it is, can either be accepted or changed. If it is not accepted, it must be changed. If it cannot be changed, then it must be accepted. I cannot control uncontrollable cancer. I cannot control other people's choices. I cannot control the passage of time, the realization of truth, the inevitably directions we must all go in to grow. Some of us are blessed to walk together; some roads converge only to reach an inevitable fork where we wish the other well and go on. I accept this wholeheartedly now, but it is not without a touch of grief. I love the people I love, and I want them in my life always. It just is what it is. It's who I am.
In the midst of this acceptance, I acknowledge the grace and strength of this love that spurs me on to change what I can. I learn from mistakes, I embrace my memories, and I never let go of the love that I have. I have changed the way I grieve broken relationships. Now I rejoice for the connections, I recognize how each loved one has positively impacted my life, and I praise God for the chance to love at all. I take Chris with me wherever I go, as I do all of my loved ones. It is as if, in many ways, she is still here. All of that love is still here. That is the definition of a legacy.
The other perspective of the art of life is the horizontal one. Broken relationships serve to remind me, over and over, that this world is fallen and broken. Life will never be without pain; suffering is the singular experience that every human being throughout history has shared. It would take a miracle of seismic historic proportion to ever overcome it.
Thank God for the gospel! Thank Him that this miracle is alive. Christ has conquered death by death and by His resurrection, has restored life to all of us! We need only to accept this for our life to have HOPE, for the purpose of existence to become CLEAR, and for LOVE to be whole and real and life-giving and life-changing.
For I know that all that has been broken in this life will be made right. I know that this power is already at work, redeeming my own self and my short and limited interaction with life, and I do not have to wait for heaven to see His love at work on earth. I accept that this is what Life really is: to love God and cherish others, forever. So I give myself humbly, fully acknowledging how small and imperfect I am, as an agent of this Life-giving love.
And I find, as I consider these things, that I already have the life I have always wanted.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Suddenly, religion and politics are the only things safe for me to talk about.
I just got back here, and I'm already stuck.
Friends, it's not that I don't have anything to talk or write about. Heaven knows (and my sister knows) that I have way too much to talk about and an unfortunate lack of awareness about when to shut up. Still, when I sit down to pound out a couple of thoughts on Le Blog, I keep coming out with things in the Very Bad To Blog About In Front Of The Whole World category. These things include, but are not limited to, the following:
The divorce. 'Nuff said.
The economy, or rather, MY economy.
Drama in my apartment complex. Seriously, we make Melrose Place look like an after school special.
Past flames. Oy vey.
Parenting snafus or mishaps. Because I am perfect, or rather, because I am smart enough not to document my own mistakes.
The Cubs.
So, Faithful Few, this is where you come in! I need YOUR ideas about what to write about! I did this once before, way back in the day, and it was fun. Just leave a comment with a suggestion or two about what you'd like to see here in the days ahead, and I will do my level best to deliver something palatable. I only request that you keep it clean. For the kids.
This is gonna be fun.
Friends, it's not that I don't have anything to talk or write about. Heaven knows (and my sister knows) that I have way too much to talk about and an unfortunate lack of awareness about when to shut up. Still, when I sit down to pound out a couple of thoughts on Le Blog, I keep coming out with things in the Very Bad To Blog About In Front Of The Whole World category. These things include, but are not limited to, the following:
The divorce. 'Nuff said.
The economy, or rather, MY economy.
Drama in my apartment complex. Seriously, we make Melrose Place look like an after school special.
Past flames. Oy vey.
Parenting snafus or mishaps. Because I am perfect, or rather, because I am smart enough not to document my own mistakes.
The Cubs.
So, Faithful Few, this is where you come in! I need YOUR ideas about what to write about! I did this once before, way back in the day, and it was fun. Just leave a comment with a suggestion or two about what you'd like to see here in the days ahead, and I will do my level best to deliver something palatable. I only request that you keep it clean. For the kids.
This is gonna be fun.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Stretching My Fingers
A quick note about my day, to stretch my fingers and satisfy my inclination to get back into my blog:
Today I finished reading Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick. It is a funny and heartwrenching book about an eighth grade boy whose little brother gets leukemia. I loved it.
Despite how hard I stared at it, the carpet cleaner simply would not run without an operator. So I plugged it in and cleaned my downstairs carpet. Now all the stains are lifted and my room smells and feels fresh and new.
My next door neighbors are having a baby! It is wonderful news.
I was introduced to the poems of Pablo Neruda tonight. He is deliciously angsty and, of course, I love it.
I have no idea what I'm going to do with my kids this weekend.
My life is about to turn upside down as I start masters courses in six days.
I have decided that I need to start watching Mad Men.
I have come to the conclusion that the most difficult person to forgive is myself.
My current favorite snack is veggies and hummus.
This has probably been the best summer of my life.
I am really excited to write again. Self publishing was invented for people like me. :)
Today I finished reading Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie by Jordan Sonnenblick. It is a funny and heartwrenching book about an eighth grade boy whose little brother gets leukemia. I loved it.
Despite how hard I stared at it, the carpet cleaner simply would not run without an operator. So I plugged it in and cleaned my downstairs carpet. Now all the stains are lifted and my room smells and feels fresh and new.
My next door neighbors are having a baby! It is wonderful news.
I was introduced to the poems of Pablo Neruda tonight. He is deliciously angsty and, of course, I love it.
I have no idea what I'm going to do with my kids this weekend.
My life is about to turn upside down as I start masters courses in six days.
I have decided that I need to start watching Mad Men.
I have come to the conclusion that the most difficult person to forgive is myself.
My current favorite snack is veggies and hummus.
This has probably been the best summer of my life.
I am really excited to write again. Self publishing was invented for people like me. :)
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Psst ... are you still here?
Dear and faithful readers, how I have missed you. I had to bow out of the blogosphere for awhile, but I was inspired by an old friend to return. In celebration, I have rearranged things here a little. It's nice to be back!
Sunday, December 14, 2008
the intrinsic inevitability of love
From Father Pat's Pastoral Ponderings:
Few themes, I suppose, are more pronounced in the teaching of Jesus than that of God's invitation. Whether to a banquet or a wedding, Jesus sees man as invited by God. I believe this divine invitation implies many considerations of anthropology, but I limit myself here to one: human dignity. God invites man for pretty much the same reason we send invitations to one another---friendship. Orthodox Christian theology has always insisted that His motive is friendship.
It is difficult, it is bewildering, and it is more than slightly frightening to assimilate the notion that God finds us loveable. It is among the most astounding truths in Holy Scripture. What could God possibly find loveable in us?
Indeed, even some Christians are so bewildered by this idea that they resort to subtleties to parse away the paradox of it. They may explain, for example, that God, being love, cannot help loving us, even though He finds nothing intrinsically loveable in us. It is taken for granted, in certain Christian circles, that God could not possibly find human beings desirable. It is assumed as obvious that there is nothing in us that would attract Him. It is impossible for God to love us for our own sake, we are told, but only because of His loving nature. He is forced to love us, as it were, because love is His definition.
Let me suggest that theories like this are difficult to reconcile with what God has told us about Himself---and us. In Holy Scripture He describes Himself as a bridegroom rejoicing over a bride, who is the apple of His eye. He speaks of Himself as a father who celebrates the return of a faithless son, in whom He recognizes His own image. Surely, these are the teachings that justify that beautiful adjective by which Holy Church addresses God: philanthropos.
When the Church calls God the "lover of mankind," She affirms an important truth about the human race: God finds man attractive. Indeed, when God made man, He put into his composition a radical point of attraction that man is incapable of destroying.
This favorable and loving attitude of God toward human beings perhaps justifies our speaking of a divine anthropotropism. God shows every sign of being drawn to man. It is hard for us to fathom this. It is as though the sun felt for the sunflower the same powerful attraction the sunflower feels for the sun. We would have to imagine a solar antheotropism prompting the sun to rush its rising each morning for another glimpse of the jonquil, the iris and the buttercup.
Holy Scripture, however, says no less of God's feelings for man. Numerous times Jeremiah, that most tenderhearted of poets, speaks of God "rising up early" to speak to the human soul (7:13,25; 11:7; 25:3,4; 26:5; 29:19; 32:33; 35:14,15; 44:4).
It is arguable, indeed, that Jeremiah was the prophet who best understood this aspect of God—and of man. It was in Israel's supremely dark hour, the dreadful day of Nebuchadnezzar and the destruction of the First Temple, that this philanthropic God declared through the lips of Jeremiah, " I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore have I drawn thee with mercy" (31:3). It is this everlasting love of God that summons humanity; it is His undying mercy that prompts the invitation He dispatches to human beings throughout the ages.
God loves us and desires us because He formed us in His own image, which is essential to---and inalienable from---the very definition of human nature. God's love for us is His response to the attraction He has made intrinsic to our being. There is absolutely nothing we can do to make God stop desiring us. Even the souls in hell are the object of His relentless affection, because they are formed in His image, the same image He saw on the day His hands gave them shape.
The truth is that God is drawn to us by love---that He has forcefully thrown in His lot with us, to the point of become one of us. This act of God---His deliberate assumption of our historical experience in order to make it His own---is what theology calls Divine Revelation, and its defining manifestation is the Mystery of the Incarnation. In the person of His Son, God has united humanity to Himself by an indissoluble bond that theology calls the Hypostatic Union. Human theotropism and divine anthropotropism are both fulfilled. Perhaps we may think of it as the mutual joy of the sunflower and the sun.
- Father Patrick Henry Reardon
Few themes, I suppose, are more pronounced in the teaching of Jesus than that of God's invitation. Whether to a banquet or a wedding, Jesus sees man as invited by God. I believe this divine invitation implies many considerations of anthropology, but I limit myself here to one: human dignity. God invites man for pretty much the same reason we send invitations to one another---friendship. Orthodox Christian theology has always insisted that His motive is friendship.
It is difficult, it is bewildering, and it is more than slightly frightening to assimilate the notion that God finds us loveable. It is among the most astounding truths in Holy Scripture. What could God possibly find loveable in us?
Indeed, even some Christians are so bewildered by this idea that they resort to subtleties to parse away the paradox of it. They may explain, for example, that God, being love, cannot help loving us, even though He finds nothing intrinsically loveable in us. It is taken for granted, in certain Christian circles, that God could not possibly find human beings desirable. It is assumed as obvious that there is nothing in us that would attract Him. It is impossible for God to love us for our own sake, we are told, but only because of His loving nature. He is forced to love us, as it were, because love is His definition.
Let me suggest that theories like this are difficult to reconcile with what God has told us about Himself---and us. In Holy Scripture He describes Himself as a bridegroom rejoicing over a bride, who is the apple of His eye. He speaks of Himself as a father who celebrates the return of a faithless son, in whom He recognizes His own image. Surely, these are the teachings that justify that beautiful adjective by which Holy Church addresses God: philanthropos.
When the Church calls God the "lover of mankind," She affirms an important truth about the human race: God finds man attractive. Indeed, when God made man, He put into his composition a radical point of attraction that man is incapable of destroying.
This favorable and loving attitude of God toward human beings perhaps justifies our speaking of a divine anthropotropism. God shows every sign of being drawn to man. It is hard for us to fathom this. It is as though the sun felt for the sunflower the same powerful attraction the sunflower feels for the sun. We would have to imagine a solar antheotropism prompting the sun to rush its rising each morning for another glimpse of the jonquil, the iris and the buttercup.
Holy Scripture, however, says no less of God's feelings for man. Numerous times Jeremiah, that most tenderhearted of poets, speaks of God "rising up early" to speak to the human soul (7:13,25; 11:7; 25:3,4; 26:5; 29:19; 32:33; 35:14,15; 44:4).
It is arguable, indeed, that Jeremiah was the prophet who best understood this aspect of God—and of man. It was in Israel's supremely dark hour, the dreadful day of Nebuchadnezzar and the destruction of the First Temple, that this philanthropic God declared through the lips of Jeremiah, " I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore have I drawn thee with mercy" (31:3). It is this everlasting love of God that summons humanity; it is His undying mercy that prompts the invitation He dispatches to human beings throughout the ages.
God loves us and desires us because He formed us in His own image, which is essential to---and inalienable from---the very definition of human nature. God's love for us is His response to the attraction He has made intrinsic to our being. There is absolutely nothing we can do to make God stop desiring us. Even the souls in hell are the object of His relentless affection, because they are formed in His image, the same image He saw on the day His hands gave them shape.
The truth is that God is drawn to us by love---that He has forcefully thrown in His lot with us, to the point of become one of us. This act of God---His deliberate assumption of our historical experience in order to make it His own---is what theology calls Divine Revelation, and its defining manifestation is the Mystery of the Incarnation. In the person of His Son, God has united humanity to Himself by an indissoluble bond that theology calls the Hypostatic Union. Human theotropism and divine anthropotropism are both fulfilled. Perhaps we may think of it as the mutual joy of the sunflower and the sun.
- Father Patrick Henry Reardon
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