Love is just like prayer; it is not so much an action that we do, but a dialogue that already flows through us. We don’t decide to “be loving”; rather, to love is to allow our deepest and truest nature to show itself. The “Father” doesn’t decide to love the “Son.” Fatherhood is the flow from Father to Son, one hundred percent. The Son does not choose now and then to release some love to the Father, or to the Spirit. Love is the full modus operandi between all three of them! (Remember these classic names are just placeholders. You can replace them with any form of endearment that works for you, but make sure something works!)
The love in you—which is the Spirit in you—always somehow says yes (see 2 Corinthians 1:19-20). Love is not something you do; love is Someone you are. It is your True Self. [1] Love is where you came from and love is where you’re going. It’s not something you can attain. It’s not something you can work up to, as much as something you allow yourself to fall into! It is the living presence of God within you, often called the Holy Spirit, or what some theologians name uncreated grace.
You can’t manufacture this by any right conduct. You can’t make God love you one ounce more than God already loves you right now. You can go to church every day for the rest of your life, but God isn’t going to love you any more than God already loves you right now.
You cannot make God love you any less, either—not an ounce less. You could do the most terrible thing and God wouldn’t love you any less. (You would probably love yourself much less, however.)
You cannot change the Divine mind about you! The flow is constant and total toward your life. God is for you!
You can’t diminish God’s love for you. What you can do, however, is learn how to believe it, receive it, trust it, allow it, and celebrate it, accepting Trinity’s whirling invitation to join in the cosmic dance.
Catherine LaCugna ends her giant theological tome on Trinity with one simple sentence. It’s taken her two-and-a-half inches of book to get to this one line, and its simplicity might overwhelm you, but I can’t end in any better place than she does:
The very nature of God, therefore, is to seek out the deepest possible communion and friendship with every last creature on this earth. [2]
That’s God’s job description. That’s what it’s all about. The only things that can keep you out of this divine dance are fear, doubt, or self-hatred. What would happen in your life—right now—if you accepted being fully accepted?
It would be a very safe universe.
You would have nothing to be afraid of.
God is for you.
God is leaping toward you!
God is on your side, honestly more than you are on your own.
~Adapted from Richard Rohr with Mike Morrell, The Divine Dance: The Trinity and Your Transformation (Whitaker House: 2016), 192-194. This book is available for pre-order at thedivinedance.org.
[1] See Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self (Jossey-Bass: 2013) for a thorough teaching on your True Self and how to access it.
[2] Catherine Mowry LaCugna, God for Us: The Trinity and Christian Life, (HarperSanFrancisco: 1993), 411.
