The author makes the statement
“Because God is love, and because human beings are made in God’s image, love is who we are. Love is not, first and foremost, something that we do. More basically, it is who we are.”
This quote of James Olthuis’ expands the idea --
“To live is to let love well up and stream through us as the beat, pulse, and rhythm of our lives, connecting us to ourselves, our neighbors, the whole family of earth’s creatures, and God, the alpha and omega of love. To love (which is to live) is to be seeking, fostering, and sustaining connections with that which is different and other – without domination, absorption, or fusion, in delight, in care, in compassion….
It is in loving (or not loving) that we are (or are not) human. It is in heeding the call of love – in making life-affirming connections – that we become human… Loving is not merely one thing among others that we are called to do – an extraordinary achievement, a heroic gesture that completes ordinary acts and raises them to a higher level. Love is not an additive, a spiritual supplement reserved for saints… loving is of the essence of being human, the connective tissue of reality, the oxygen of life.” - James Olthuis (P 97)
It is in loving (or not loving) that we are (or are not) human. It is in heeding the call of love – in making life-affirming connections – that we become human… Loving is not merely one thing among others that we are called to do – an extraordinary achievement, a heroic gesture that completes ordinary acts and raises them to a higher level. Love is not an additive, a spiritual supplement reserved for saints… loving is of the essence of being human, the connective tissue of reality, the oxygen of life.” - James Olthuis (P 97)
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