The joy of God.

I believe that the betrothed, united by the mystery of love, perceive that ‘indefinable’ Light even more than it is made known in the beauty of the universe and the beauty of the human soul. If man’s vocation is to be the light of the world, his life must necessarily be directed in some way toward God. Love is a leap off a cliff, not a speculation to put into a relationship more than a partner. Love forgets when it is wronged, justifies everything, believes everything, never grieves over anything and endures everything. Love is a flight of steepness and not a business calculation. The French priest Daniel- -Ange founded the community Joie-de-Dieu, Joy of God. Marriage would also be a community where, along with the joy of God, there should be Joie-de-Toi, the joy of you.

At one time, a friend gave me a bungee for my birthday jump, a jump from a height on a bungee cord. Many years later, it occurred to me, that just as I was bouncing off the bridge and looking into the Danube
somewhere below me, I experienced for myself a very accurate image of what love must be. Love, like the jump, cannot be experienced only on trial, with the back door open. Love, like the jump, it either is or it isn’t. If it is on trial, then it does not deserve its name. One cannot give or die or love on trial! He said in one John Paul II. There is no point in just dating someone and not jumping into a relationship.

What can say more about God here on earth than beauty materialized, molded into the form of a girl? The rivers will not wash away love. The floods of the waters will not extinguish it. In one moment one suddenly understands why the Pope, after speaking from the plane, kisses the earth; and you have a similar desire: to kiss the earth that bears the visible sign of God’s invisible beauty. It is said of the Apostle John that at the end of his life, he was able to utter a single sentence, “God is love.” Of St. Francis, it is said we can read that in the same spirit, he made do all night long with a short prayer, My God, my all. Lovers may have a similar experience. There are nights during which the only thought the soul can utter is I love you – I love you – I love you, repeated as prayers of Russian monks, nothing more. Silence. Loving one another and praying – what more beautiful, what nobler, what better or what more worthy thing can we do in this world? What more worthy lot can a man have on earth? There is a difference between “loving” and “praying,” if the end of both refers to God.