MARCH 9, 1996

AMERICA VOL. 174 NO, 8

The Eclipse of Love for God

w, By EDWARD COLLINS VACEK

HEN DAVID HARE INTERVIEWED CLERGY as part of his

research for his play, "Racing Demons," he ran into a problem: None of
the priests wanted to talk about God. One of the disturbing questions his
play rai.ses is whether contemporary Christians, with the exception of a
Almost all few fanatical fundamentalists, are coticenied about loving God.
In my own conversations with Christians. I find that almost all of
Christians talk them talk approvingly about love for others, some talk confidently about
God's love for us. but few are willing to talk about their love for God.
approvingly about When I press them to say what it means to love God, some of them in
fact detiy that we can love God directly, many admit that they don't give
love for others; some mueh thought to love for God and most deny that there is any ethical
obligation to do so. They judge that it is wrong not to love people, but
talk confidently they have no such thoughts about neglecting God. In short, many eon-
temporary Christians subscribe to Jesus' second great commandment,
about God's love but not to his first.
In the 17th century, some historians of spirituality point out. people
for us; but few are thought the essence of Christian life was to draw close to God. After the
18th century, however, the point of Christian life became service of
neighbor. Today, for example, people generally consider Mother Teresa a
willing to talk saint. But most people do so because of her devotion to the poor. Seldom
does anyone say she is a saint because her love of God is so intense,
about their love though that onee was the primary meaning of sanetity.

for God. Contemporary Objections.

When I ask my students, "What do you mean by love for God?" they
usually give one of four answers. Some volunteer that loving Gixl means
keeping the commandments, like not kiUing or stealing. Most say that
loving God means helpitig one's neighbor. The more theologically edu-
cated add that it means taking eare of the poor. Lastly, those steeped in
our psychological age share that loving God means caring for one's own

EDWARD COLLINS VACEK, S.J,, is a.ssociate professor of moral the-

ology at Weston Jesuit School of Theology and author of Love, Human
and Divine: The Heart of Christian Ethics (Georgetown Univ. Press.
1994). This year he holds the McKeever Chair in moral theology at St.
John's University, Jamaica, N.Y.

AMERICA MARCH 9, 1996 13

deepest self. All seem not to notice that atheists affirm
these four practices.
Many theologians have also set aside Jesus" first great
commandment. They do so for theological reasons. Some
note, for example, that the pertect God has no need of us;
hence our love for God does nothing for God. Indeed,
love for neighbor rightly enjoys a certain advantage over
love for God, since the fonner is good both for the neigh-
bor and lor us.
Other theologians, following
the strand of Karl Rahner's
thought that stressed anonymous
Christianity, claim that the one
necessary love is love for neigh- There is a
bor. In their view. Matthew 25
shows that we do not have to great difference between
think about God; all we must do
is serve the neighbor. Thus athe-
ists, paradoxically, may be
seeking the truth and
"more Christian" than believers
since those who set aside time to
being in a personal
develop their relationship with
God through prayer and reading relationship with God.
may be wasting precious time
and energy tbat could better be Those who love God
used to help needy neighbors.
Supporters of pluralism are
live differently.
also inclined to reject tbe moral
demand that everyone love
God. For them, such love is an
option, of course; but tbere are
other options, Jesus" cotnniand is for religious people, not
for nonbelievers. Even for believers, love for God is
sujiererogatory. not an ethical obligation.
Furthermore, ordinary people recognize that, even
though we can perform certain behaviors on command,
we cannot will ourselves to have emotions. Emotions,
including love, are not tbe sorts of acts we can just decide
to have. Hence, many hold that wbile we are morally
obliged to do the vt'orks of love, there can be no ethical
requirement to love God.
Some theologians, following ceitain mysties. raise
another dilculty. God is transcendent and utterly incom-
prehensible. But. since we cannot love what we cannot
know, we cannot love God. These Christians are joined by
others who hold thatin the dai'kness of this post-death-
of-Gtxi and post-Holix;aust eraall we can do is to wait
patiently tor some new revelation from God. We sbould
not expect ourselves to love tbe God who is uneanny,
awesome, unfathomable mystery and who seems more
absent than present.
Others argue that love for God is not really central in
Christianity. Classical tbeological traditions have centered
on obedience to God's will or on tiiist in God's promises,
not on love for God. Si. Paul, for exiunpie, speaks rarely of
love for God. Instead he champions faith in Gtxl, and for
him the whole law boils down to love of neighbor (Gal.
14
5:14. 6:2; Rom. 13: 8-10). Pauline tbeologiatis note that it is
God's love, not our own. that flows in our hearts.
Tbus, tbeology encourages tbe current tendency to col-
lapse the first great commandment into the second.
Although John wrote, "those who love God must love tbeir
brothers and sisters also" (1 Jn. 4:21), thereby indicating that
love for neighbor presupposes love for God. today a number
of theological positions conspire to suggest that love for
neighbor suffices. Where Jesus
urged that we love God with
our whole mind, heart, sou!
and strength, today we urge
one another actively to love
our neigbbor andharder for
manyto love our own selves.
Direct Love for God.
I want to argue that love of
creatures is not enough. Just as
we must eat and tbink and
play, or else we wither and die,
and just as we must develop
good relations witb other
human beings if we are to
develop as persons, so also we
cannot hope to become fully
human unless we love God.
We are essentially relational
beings. We are stunted when
our relational potentials are
unfulfilled. We have a native
desire for God, and our hearts will shrivel up unless tbey
beat for God. Hence, in order to become fully who we are,
we must be growing in love for God.
The off-putting implication of this otherwise pious-
sounding claim is that atheists or agnostics or even exclu-
sively neigbbor-loving Christians are living objectively
unethical lives. That claim strikes many as too haish. Let
me offer thiee clarifications. First, I am speaking of wbat
objectively ought to be the ease. I do not say that sincere
atheists, agnostics or neigbbor-ioving Christians are sin-
ners. Presumably they are following tbeir conscience. If
so. tbey are morally good. Nevertheless, tbeir consciences
are mistaken. Their understanding of buman life is ineom-
plete. Their life is not all it should be.
Second, my fellow tbeologians. influenced by people
Hke Rabner. doubtless will argue that atheists, if they are
sincere and not just lazy, seek the truth. But. since God is
truth itself, tbese atheists are in fact seeking God. All they
get wrong, so to speak, is the name. To tbis position, I
offer a personalist's response. Existentially, there is a great
difference between seeking the truth and being in a per-
sonal relationship with God. Those wbo love Gtxl live dif-
ferently. They engage in time-tested ways of developing
this relationship, e.g., celebrating tbe Eucharist or partici-
pating in retreats. They pray and are attentive for a per-
sonal word from God. They contemplate and rely on Jesus
AMERICA MARCHO. I99fi
Christ. Those wbo are not in a personal relationship with
the Christian God will not do these sorts of things, and so
they cannot similarly develop this most important dimen-
sion of human life.
Third, the lives of people without love for God can be
morally right in other aspects. We human beings usually
are quite ethical in one part of our lives, wobbly in anoth-
er part and downright wrong in yet another part. Indeed,
ihere is embarrassing social science evidence that in the
rest of their lives atheists are, on average, better human
beings than Christians. Dostoevski notwithstanding, athe-
ists quite often are more honest, more generous and more
courageous than Christians. Still, in one very important
area of their lives, those who do not love God are defi-
cient human beings. Just as a man can be good to his chil-
dren but neglect his wife, so many people who are other-
wise wonderful persons lack this demanding and uplifting
relationship.
In shon. it is not enough just to love our fellow human
beings. Sincere conscience and anonymous theism are not
enough. To give a parallel: Imagine that I put out food for
a stray dog I happen to like, but that unbeknownst to me
the dog belongs to a rich but stingy woman I despise.
Physically, one might say that I am serving the rich
woman, but morally speaking that is not what I am doing.
Similarly, giving water to a stranger is quite different from
desiring to serve Christ. Our explicit intentions make a
great difference in our moral life.
It is also not enough to love creatures explicitly as a
way of showing love to God. At times, we can and must
also direct our love immediately iuid directly to God. Of
course, one way of expressing love for God is to care for
God's creation. But much as taking the garbage out for
sick neighbors is no substitute for directly developing an
interpersonal relationship with them, so too doing good
works to show love for God presupposes other activities
devoted to directly loving God.
A Contemporary Challenge.
Every age has its centriil religious concept. At one time
the question of faith energized. Today Christians often
answer the question "Do you believe in God?" with little
investment. The question "Do you trust God?" is more
involving, but it still leaves in abeyance the way we live our
lives. A question that will challenge all of us today is this:
"Do you love God?" That question evokes the endlessness
of our heart's quest as well as the incomprehensibility of
God. and it gives us an absorbing center for our lives.
I imagine that when Jesus went off to pray he was not
just gathering up energy to love his fellow human beings,
nor was he simply purifying and developing his inner life.
Rather, he chose to spend time with his Abba. He wanted
and needed that time. He prayed, and in that prayer he
united his mind and heart with God. Our love for God
requires something similar.
How might such a relationship develop? The first step

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AMERICA MARCH 9, 1996 15

 is one that, generally speaking, women seem to under-
stand more quickly than men. That step is to accept God's
love for us. In other words, our first response is noi to
return love to God. but rather to let God's love affect or
change us. We deny God's transfonning influence if we
rush to return love to God or to spread love to our neigh-
bor. Sitting with eyes closed and hands open, we let God's
love touch and move us; there begins our salvation.
Thereafter, we can and should
love God in return. Love means
that we affectively affinn God's
goodness. We want to be close
to God, and we rejoice when we
are close. At the same time our
love for God will not long let us It is not enough
rest, but moves us to penetrate
ever more appreciatively into just to love our fellow
God's goodness. Correlative I y,
we are disconsolate when we human beings.
are alienated from God. We
miss God when God no longer
seems near.
Sincere conscience
Our love for God also makes
us want to cooperate with God
and anonymous theism
in doing what God wants to do.
That leads us to be involved in
are not enough.
creation. Hence love for God
at one level moves us into
the incomprehensibility of
God and at another level
moves us both to cherish the
world and to want to overcome its ills and injustices.
Clearly, this love for God is not reducible to texts read,
prayers said or gifts offered. It is not simply a matter of
obedience or trust. Rather, this love for God can and
should become the dominant, organizing emotional center
of our whole lives. Moses Maimonides, the great
medieval Jewish philosopher, argued that love for God
should be similar to the passion a man has for a woman.
For Aquinas, diose who love like this constantly think of
one another, constantly try to please one another. This
pr(.K:ess of attention grows and grows until it becomes a
pervasive feature of one's whole emotional life. So it can
be with our love for God.
There will be periods of rapid and intense growth in
this love. Births of babies and failures in achieving goals
are prime times for spurts in our love for God. Then come
quieter periods in which we just maintain a good relation-
ship. The quiet periods prepare the way for a deeper rela-
tionship that we cannot force, but for which we can hope.
As we grow in love for God, this love becomes more a
pail of our very identity. It more and more informs who
we iue. For example, if asked to do a new job, one of the
first questions that enters our mind is how this new task
might affect our relationship with God.
Before closhig this essay. I want to describe briefly
three forms of love for God. We can have an agapic love.
16
an eras love or a philia love for God. Normally we will
have all three mixed together. Agape, as I use the term,
means love of something for its own sake. So, with an
agapic love for God, we are not concerned for ourselves
but are devoted to God for God's sake. Christian tradition
posed an extremely provocative question to smoke out
this kind of love; "If it would please God just a bit. would
you be willing to suffer in hell forever?" The question,
of course, is unreal, and the
Cathohc Church condemns the
teaching that we must have
pure love for God. Never-
theless, the question quickly
clarifies where our tlnal loyal-
ties lie. Agape is represented
by the cross of Christ. That
cross says we may have to
give up our lives in order to be
loyal to God.
Second, eros means loving
someone for our own sake. In
the traditional act of contrition,
Christians have prayed that
they are hearily sorry for their
sins because they dread the
loss of heaven and the pains of
hell, but most of all because
these sins offend God. Their
sorrow over offending God
expresses agape. Their dread
about losing God and going to
hell expresses eros. An eros love for God is a genuine
love. It is a biblical love, and it is quite Catholic. We love
God for the good we gain in being close to God.
Third, we have a philia love when we love God for the
sake of the "friendship" we share with God. Our Jewish
ancestors fornied covenants with God. and through baptism
we Christians fonn a new covenant with God. We are God's
people, and God is "our Gtxl." We live out of this relation-
ship. We do religious things like sing in church, but we also
relax at the seashore and work hard at the soup kitchen. The
difference between us and unbelievers is that we want to do
these things as ptirt of ourrelationshipwith G(.K1. Growing in
that desire is what it means to become a saint.
At the end of this essay, let me make it clear that in
speaking of love for God, I do not mean to exclude love
for neighbor or self or world. Rather, love for God leads
us to cooperate with God's love of the world. Hence
strange as it seemsone of the reasons we want to love
ourselves and others is that we want thereby to cooperate
with God's love for us. In a profoundly religious sense,
we are aware that the ordinary and usually best way that
God can love creatures is through our love for them. Still,
although love for neighbor and love for self are essential
to the Christian hfe. my concern here is that we must not
let these wholesome Christian loves eclipse our love for
God. That love should be the sun of our lives. O
AMERICA MARCH 9, 1996