Love is Love
As I typed out the subject line of this post, it dawned on me that it's the title of a Culture Club song that was featured on the Electric Dreams soundtrack.
So I spied a post by someone lauding the beauty of Christian Love. What exactly is that? The entire post dripped of some misplaced spiritual superiority, as though Christian Love is better than your common, run-of-the-mill, lowly love.
The message I get from language like this drips of division and separatism. I may be wrong, but I seem to remember that Jesus Christ was incredibly inclusive, especially considering the time and place of his activities. Why his (fake) followers need to feel so special that they set themselves aside is beyond my limited comprehension.
Again, to echo the Culture Club song, love is love. To give it any other designation is an insult to the very ideal of love, in my opinion. And I'm not just speaking of Christians here, now. Any sort of love, be it "romantic", "platonic", straight, gay, motherly, fatherly, sisterly, brother, etcetera, is simply and beautifully love. And we are lucky if we ever feel it or are the recipient of it. Many say God is love. If that is the case, then the word "love" should be enough. By its very nature, love is inclusive. It is an invitation to trust and bond with one another, our fellow Earthlings, and our divine source. To label it any other way is detrimental in every way.
And love is not just a word, obviously. It is the expression of our deep connection, and we should act accordingly. You cannot love, then set yourself apart from everyone else by defining the "type" of love you're feeling. That behaviour is the very antithesis of what the phenomenon is about. And, considering the behaviour of a lot of folks who claim to be Christian these days, many people who use the term Christian Love are doing their faith an incredible disservice.