MEN, WOMEN, AND LOVE

If you listen to people talking about love between men and women, you will quickly find that the love they describe may have only a slight, or even no, resemblance to the love you found when you searched your heart, mind, and soul. Many men and women sincerely believe love is a physical attraction between the sexes that somehow magically appears, must be cultivated by keeping the partner interested, and sometimes simply fades away. From the rush of adrenaline and the pounding heart which accompanies puppy love, to the passionate emotions of the "perfect" affair, most of humankind accepts, and in fact welcomes, the pleasant feelings of sexual thoughts and deeds.

All manner of sexual experiences are accepted without question. From the "innocent" enjoyment of a beauty contest, to the pleasures of casual sex, to unbelievable perversions, people enjoy whatever degree of sexual excitement their background and their "morals" will allow. Each of these indulgences is justified by some form of argument about sex being only natural, and feeling good being all right.

Even those whose ideas about love and marriage are more traditional are often lulled into what, for lack of a better description, may be called romantic love. The intense emotions that accompany any relationship, plus the pressures of society, combine to push people into playing stereotypical roles of dating. Men and women do the best they can to be interesting to each other, to make each other have a good time, and particularly not to rock the romantic boat. A general fear of being unpopular, of losing favor with another person, of being an oddball, runs through most people's minds.

When a man and a woman fall into playing "the game of love" they lose their identity as people who can truly love each other. Even though they may think what they are feeling is love for one another, it is more often infatuation with the romantic atmosphere and the idealized images of themselves they have created. The question is asked with increasing frequency, can a man and a woman really love each other for the rest of their lives?

Think a few minutes about the love you found when you searched your heart, mind, and soul. Then think about giving that love to another person, and in return being loved by them. If you truly understand love, you will understand that true love can exist between any two people, and that true love between a man and a woman can exist. The love you find in your heart, mind, and soul is far more than physical attraction, or magical moments. It is the ultimate, joyful relationship between two people, where each person cares as much for the other person as for himself or herself. If you understand love, you know it is the deepest commitment one human being can give another.

If a man loves a woman, and a woman a man, when they look in each other's eyes they are not filled with lust, they are filled with love for each other. When their hands touch they are not filled with desire, they are filled with deep feelings of love. When they are with each other they know their love will not fade but will truly last their lifetimes. If they decide they want to spend the rest of their lives together as husband and wife, then they marry (we will discuss later whether we should marry or not), and perhaps have a family. They choose to live their lives as if they were “one flesh”.

Some readers will throw their hands up and exclaim what simplistic mishmash this is, life is no where near as easy as that, nor are human relationships that simple. Those who understand love know that what I am describing is far from simplistic. If you truly understand love, you will understand that the love I am describing is the basis of the deepest and most profound relationship two people can have. What makes these sentences sound naive and childish is the tendency of all of us to equate the word love with what we have been told love is. Novels, movies, poets, television, rock stars, friends, parents, teachers, have told us love is some sort of fragile entity which comes and goes with adversity and changes in the weather.

To people who only understand love in so limited and weak a form, the idea of deep and permanent love shared by two people seems a romantic absurdity. It is little wonder they find it almost impossible to believe true love can exist between a husband and a wife. Yet those who have completed their search and know and understand love, understand what it means to say that a man and woman who love each other and choose to marry, become as “one flesh”. They also know and understand why, instead of saying the husband and wife become as “one being”, we say they become as “one flesh”. Those who become as “one flesh” continue to be individual human beings, each one continues to have the independent choice to love people, or not to love people. When we say they become as “one”, we are not saying that they become as “one being”, we are saying they continue to be two individuals who become as “one flesh”.

I am not suggesting sex is evil, indeed having a family is one of the strongest expressions of love between two people who have chosen to marry and live their lives together as “one”. What I am saying is that if two people truly love each other, they are not attracted to each other by desire for physical pleasure, they are brought together by love. When they are with each other, they have real, true, deep, love, in their hearts.

It is often difficult for people who have decided to marry to understand why it is wrong for them to express their love before marriage through sex. They see sex between two people who are truly committed to becoming as one with each other for the rest of their lives, as being far different from sex between people whose commitment may be something less, or none at all. There is no question it is the commitment that unites two people, and not the legal institution of marriage. Yet marriage is much more than a legal formality.

If marriage was measured by its legal utility it would be quite insignificant, fortunately it is more than the granting of a license. Marriage is the moment of final commitment when two people declare to the world and to themselves their love and their decision to live as one. By tradition it is the point in time when two people join together, yet more than tradition, it is when human beings who truly love one another know in their hearts that their commitment is complete. It is the single act of marriage that marks the combining of two lives.

Any physical joining between two people before this total commitment is complete, weakens forever the bond of love between them. On their wedding day, a person becomes one with someone they love, physically, intellectually, emotionally, and in a deeper sense we cannot describe. When two people have sex before this final expression of their commitment, the sex they enjoy is not part of the ultimate joining of two human beings. Sex before marriage is something less than the final confirmation of the decision to give a lifetime of love to another person. It robs people of that one moment in their lives that should be the beginning of their marriage. Those who engage in sex before marriage, even if they do so the night before a marriage that will last their lifetimes, will feel a loss of love, however slight, in their hearts.

Those who wait until they are married will find much more than physical pleasure. They will be engulfed by a unique sea of joyful emotions as love joins two people who, for the first time in their lives, are truly one with each other. Each of us has only one opportunity to experience that moment, yet we have hundreds of opportunities to lose that chance forever.

What we are saying does not in any way mean that those who have already lost that unique moment, cannot still choose to love people for the rest of their lives. Those of you who have had sexual relations outside marriage, can choose to love people now and for the rest of your lives. Perhaps you will have the opportunity to love and marry the person with whom you had sexual relations. If you do not have the opportunity to marry that person, that does not in any way change the fact that it is your choice to love people, or not to love them. From this moment on, it is your choice, and your choice alone, to love or not to love. Even if you have not loved in the past, you can make the choice to give to all people, for the rest of your life, the true, pure, real, love you find in your heart, mind, and soul.

What about divorce? Again, the answer comes from truly understanding deep, real love. If a man and a woman choose to love each other and live their lives as one, what can make them change their minds? So long as two people choose to love each other they will never part. Remember, what we are talking about is true, deep love, not that which is called love but is only a shadowy illusion which fades in the light of dawn. We are talking about the love a husband can always choose to give a wife, and a wife can always choose to give a husband, love very few couples are willing to share.

Those who choose love don't fight over daily living, they are not annoyed by each other, they do not need to constantly worry about keeping their partner's love. They compromise, they try to understand each other's problems, and they support each other's efforts. They share love. Of course there will be problems and difficulties, yet they will face them together. Men and women who choose to love each other and become as one, will live the rest of their lives together as husband and wife.

But what if one spouse chooses not to love the other? If you understand love, you know that even if you are not loved you can love. You know that the answer to marital problems is not separating, but is for each spouse to choose to love the other. If one partner chooses not to love, their spouse should continue to love them and hope, even if it never happens, that they will once again be loved. A spouse who wants a divorce may make it impossible for the other person to live with them, or even to be near them, perhaps ever again, but that does not mean the rejected spouse should quit loving their husband or wife. Even if one spouse breaks the legal ties, their partner should continue to love them, and remain in their heart, mind, and soul married to them for life.

What about the millions of women and men who meet without any intention of marriage, what harm is there in the pleasure of a little sex among friends? The answer to that question is a difficult one that, at least for this and future generations, seems far harder to grasp than for previous generations. Indeed sex is not new, and perhaps casual sex was quietly practiced as much or more in the past as it is today, yet it was generally accepted that it was "not right". Today that idea has faded, and for many sex has become a popular sport.

The answer to the question of casual sex is not found in logical arguments, or in medical reports extolling the mental and physical benefits of an active sex life. It is found in an understanding of love. If you truly understand love, you understand what it means for a man and a woman to choose to love each other and live as one for their entire lives. If you understand love, you know that when two people who are not married choose to have sex, they are choosing the opposite of living together as one for life.

The ultimate purpose of sex in marriage is the creation of a new human life. Love between a husband and wife, conception and birth, and the giving of love to a child, makes sex far more than a physical act. All sexual acts and relationships entered into, not for the purpose of having a child, but rather for physical pleasure, or even emotional pleasure, subtly destroy the true love men and women can give each other, and weaken the real love all human beings can share. Having children is not only an expression of love between a man and a woman who choose to marry, it is an expression of love for the whole human race. Each child born as a result of the love of each spouse for the other, is born into and becomes part of a family filled with love. Each child born as a result of true love, adds to this world a family filled with people who truly love people.

Whether or not the purpose of having a child is or can be fulfilled, it is none-the-less a goal of a husband and wife who truly love each other when they choose to become as one flesh. When physical or emotional pleasure from sexual relations is one of the goals of a human relationship, the true love that a man and woman who choose to marry can share is slowly destroyed. When a man and a woman, or for that matter two men or two women, seek physical or emotional pleasure from sexual relations with each other, they not only weaken their love for each other, they weaken their love for all people. Every sexual act that has pleasure as its goal, renders sex less than an expression of love between spouses who are one with each other, and weakens our love of all people.

Yet the temptation of physical pleasure dims our resolve and muddies our recognition that to gain sexual pleasure, inside or outside marriage, love must be abandoned. Each time you choose sex instead of the lifetime of love that can be shared by a man and a woman who choose to marry, you not only reject love between you and your partner, but you reject love itself. Sex within marriage can be an expression of the love two people can give one another, every sexual act outside marriage denies that love.

It is hard to imagine how anyone could treat another person as an object from which they derive physical, or emotional, pleasure one moment, and the next moment love other people as human beings. The dehumanizing effect of sex for physical and emotional pleasure extends far beyond the moment and the relationship of the people involved, it follows them into their daily lives. Not loving even one person makes it difficult, or impossible, for someone to love all people. Each time someone chooses a moment of physical or emotional pleasure, it not only weakens their love for a wife or husband, it weakens their love for all people. Eventually they may not truly love anyone at all.

If you lust for someone, your love for them will grow weaker and weaker as physical and emotional pleasure replaces love. If you love someone you will have love for them, not lust, in your heart, mind, and soul. Remember, even if you have not loved in the past, you can make the choice to love now and for the rest of your life.

We have said that if two people love each other they will not have sexual relations with each other unless and until they choose to marry and live the rest of their lives as "one". We have concluded that lust and sex outside marriage destroys love, but that does not really answer the question of whether or not we should marry? If we truly love all people, is it possible that we should choose not to focus our love on one person, on a spouse? Is it possible that if we love all people, we should choose not to marry?

If we love a spouse the focus of much of our love will be turned toward them and away from other people. If we love a child we will focus our love on that child as we guide them through infancy to adulthood. I do not see how it is possible not to direct toward our spouse and child some of the love we would give to others if we did not have a spouse and child. If we love a spouse it would seem clear that as we live our lives as "one" we will focus some of the love that we could give to our neighbors on our spouse instead. Even if both of us want to love others, it would seem to be impossible for two who are "one" to give as much love to as many people as they would be able to give if they could go out into the world without having a spouse. Similarly, one might say that there is little difference in the focusing of love on a child or a sick neighbor, as both represent one person loving another, yet it seems that the love we give a child would diminish the love that we should give to everyone.

It seems likely that there will be times when we focus our love on our spouse and child, and will provide food, water, and clothing for our spouse and child, even if our neighbor is hungry, thirsty, and cold. Indeed, it seems true that there is no harm done if we never marry, no harm done to a child who is never conceived, yet there is harm done by focusing our love on a spouse and child, while other people need food, water, and our companionship. If you marry you will focus some of your love on your spouse, and any children, and you will give less love to other people. My conclusion is that if you choose to love all people with the love that, if it is to be given to one, must be given to all, you should not marry. This is a very difficult conclusion, yet I believe that if you complete your search of your heart, mind, and soul, and know and understand love, you will reach the same conclusion.

I believe you will also reach the conclusion we discussed earlier, that if you do choose to marry, or you are already married, you will not divorce. This may seem contradictory, but it is not. By choosing not to marry, a person does not separate two people who have become as one. However, if a person divorces his or her spouse, they "tear apart" two people who have become as one. It seems intuitively true to me that a person who divorces their spouse will not continue to love the person who was their spouse with the love that we can and should give to all people. It seems to me that even though we should not marry, if we do choose to marry or we are married, we should not divorce (be sure to read the Notes “A Lesser Love” and “A Fanatic Life Or A Normal Life?” for more discussion on difficult topics).

What about the millions upon millions of people who most would conclude do not "lust" for each other, but who look at each other as being physically attractive, and who may "flirt" with each other? When the vast majority of people look at each other, at least to some extent they see each other as more or less physically attractive, as having a more or less pleasant personality, as being more or less desirable to be with, etc. Far beyond the question of sexual attraction, most human beings will tell you that they get along better with people who exhibit “compatible” personality traits. Indeed, most people have a group of "friends" they enjoy being with. It seems that people like to be around people who make them "feel good". Is there anything wrong with that?

If when you look at someone you are looking for something in them that makes you feel good, whether that may be "innocent" sexual attractiveness or delightful conversation or something else, you are not giving them the love that is in your heart, mind, and soul. If you love someone, when you look at them you do not have thoughts about their physical appearance. If you love someone, you do not think about what their personality is like. If you love someone, you do not have thoughts about whether or not you want to be around them and be their friend. If you love someone, you do not have thoughts about whether or not they make you "feel good". If you love someone, when you look at them you have love for them in your heart, mind, and soul.

If you give someone true, pure, real, love, you will love them, and you will not think of them as someone you do or do not want to be around. You will love all people, including those who other people consider to be ugly or dull or stupid or inferior. When you look at them you will not see someone who is sexually attractive or vivacious or funny or popular, you will see someone you love. When you look at them you will not see someone who is ugly or dull or stupid or inferior, or anything else, you will see someone you love. If you give to everyone, the true, pure, real, love that is in your heart, mind, and soul, they will be more than your friends, they will be your family, a family that you love.

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