Editorial
Bishop’s wedding message on the power of love is for everyone
“There is power in love.” Those simple words by the U.S. Episcopal Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, preaching at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle remind us of our call to love.
At the royal wedding, he cited America’s “King,” Martin Luther King Jr., who said, “we must discover the power of love, the redemptive power of love, and when we do that we will make of this old world a new world. For love is the only way.”
The bishop wasn’t talking about over-sentimentalizing the power of romantic love at the time of a wedding, but recognizing the power we have when we know we are loved.
“We are made by a power of love,” he said. “Our lives were meant and are meant to be lived in that love.”
The source of love is God, because God is love, said Bishop Curry.
“There is a power in love to help and heal when nothing else can,” the bishop continued, making the point that love is about more than a young couple.
Jesus reminded of scriptures saying we are to “love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind and all our strength” and then we are also to love our neighbor as ourself.
Again the bishop made it simple: Love God. Love your neighbor. Love yourself.
On that basis, he said that Jesus began “the most revolutionary movement of all human history, a movement grounded in the unconditional love of God for the world, a movement mandating people to live that love, and in so doing, to change not only their lives, but every life of the world itself.”
Bishop Curry made the point that when love is “unselfish, sacrificial and redemptive,” it changes lives. He invited us to imagine a world, families, neighborhoods, communities, governments, nations, business and commerce “where love is the way.”
When love is the way, no child is hungry, justice rolls down, poverty is history, we lay down our swords and shields, and we treat each other like family.
Bishop Curry recounted how the discovery of fire built today’s civilization. He added that if humanity ever captures the energy of love—as it has harnessed fire—it will be the second time in history that “we have discovered fire.”
He concluded that Dr. King was right, “we must discover love—the redemptive power of love. When we do that, we will make of this old world a new world.”
Wow! The bishop took us back to the simple basis of our faith and many faiths—the power of love to change lives, families, communities, nations and the world.
That simple, but we make it so hard, because we are easily caught up in selfishness, greed, lust, lies, hate, division, oppression, injustice, grief, anger, hunger, poverty, homelessness, war, racism and inhumanity.
There’s a power in love to overcome the hurts, if we let it. There’s a power in love to reconcile. There’s a power in love to negotiate an end to spending trillions of dollars on nuclear weapons that would end all life on earth.
Love has always been radical and risky.
Jesus died because of love. Gandhi died because of love. Martin Luther King Jr. died because of love. They also lived to love and to spread love.
How are we living out love? How are we making love grow?
Mary Stamp
Editor
Copyright © June 2018 - The Fig Tree