The fact that God's love is completely passionate and completely self-giving— total eros and total agape—has important implications for our lives because the divine perfection of eros in agape serves as the model for human love.
But how can we weak and sinful human beings imitate God's perfect love? Too often, our human love is trapped in eros and tainted by self-centeredness. A man may, for example, sincerely desire to love his wife with sacrificial, self- giving love. But in reality, he often falls very short of the mark, weighed down by his own selfishness, laziness, pride, and fear.
If left to our own powers, we would have no hope of fully reaching the level of agape in our marriages. But Pope Benedict reminds us that there is a higher love that can transform our hearts, our marriages, and all our relationships by making us love more like Christ. That divine love is found in the Eucharist.
When Catholics talk about the Eucharist, we commonly speak of the Real Presence of Jesus Christ and receiving His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. But Pope Benedict goes a step further to note that when we receive Jesus in the Eucharist, we also “enter into the very dynamic of his self-giving” (no. 13). In other words, in Holy Communion, we become united to the same Body and Blood that Jesus offered up in perfect agape love for our sins. With Christ's very divine love in us through the Eucharist, our own self-centered, human love begins to be healed and to become ever more sacrificial like Christ's.
The Eucharist draws us into Jesus' act of self-oblation. More than just statically receiving the incarnate Logos, we enter into the very dynamic of his self-giving. The imagery of marriage between God and Israel is now realized in a way previously inconceivable: it had meant standing in God's presence, but now it becomes union with God through sharing in Jesus' self-gift, sharing in his body and blood. (no. 13)
Pope Benedict goes on to note how in the early Church, the word agape actually became a term for describing the Eucharist. This is most fitting, for in the Eucharist, “God's own agape comes to us bodily, in order to continue his work in us and through us” (no. 14). And for most of us, there is an awful lot of work God needs to do in us so that we can love more and more like Him! Indeed, Holy Communion draws us out of ourselves and into His love, so that He may heal our weak, fallen human love—tainted as it is by selfishness and fear— and transform it with His perfect, divine, self-giving love.
Therefore, if we want stronger marriages and stronger relationships—if we want to move out of a predominantly self-seeking eros and toward an eros that is permeated by self-giving agape—we must turn to the source of perfect love in the Eucharist. For whenever we go to Mass, we enter into the mystery of Christ's passionate love for humanity (eros), which drove Him to total self-giving love for us on the cross (agape). It is in the Eucharist that our weak, fallen, selfish hearts are transformed the most by the totally passionate and totally self-giving love of Jesus Christ, giving us the power to love others far beyond what we could ever do on our own.
Discussion Questions
1. How do people tend to view love today?
2. How does Pope Benedict's description of authentic love differ from what the world
says about love?
3. Explain in your own words the difference between eros and agape. What is the
relationship between these two aspects of love?
4. What are some of the dangers of eros? How does eros on its own keep authentic, long-
lasting love from developing?
5. Pope Benedict teaches that God's love is both eros and agape. How is this so? In what
way do these two aspects of love come together in God's love for us? How is this a
model for human love?
6. Take a moment to think about how you are falling short of agape love in your
relationship with your spouse/fiancé. In what specific ways are you self-centered,
seeking your own pleasure, comfort, and preferences rather than seeking to serve first
the needs of your spouse/fiancé? What practical things can you do to grow in selfless,
self-giving love?
Edward Sri, S.T.D., is professor of theology and scripture at the Augustine Institute's Masters in Catechesis and Evangelization program in Denver, Colorado. He is the author of several books including, Mystery of the Kingdom (Emmaus Road) and a Catholic best-selling book on the Rosary, The New Rosary in
Scripture (Servant).
Elizabeth Sri served as one of the first missionaries in FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students) and has written and led several Bible studies. She is the mother of four children and a full-time homemaker.
1 ^This chapter is adapted from an article that originally appeared in the Knights of Columbus magazine,