This-essay is a8402191.htm which is available at the web-site www.essayz.com. See more notes at the bottom. Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay By-Months By-Years By-Words Webs of Like-&-Un-Like ESSAYS <==> Like-&-UN-Like This-One ========================================================== %ESSENCE OF LOVE 840219 The word "love" is used to point to many real aspects of human relationships, some of which are nobel and others less nobel. The essence of the most nobel aspects of love can not be captured in or controlled by any verbal declarations; rather we become aware of them in the lives of the most nobel people we know and who help us fulfill our creative potentials with personal and communal integrity. There is no one test which will infallibly reveal whether or not any specific act is an act of love. Love does not seek to validate itself as love. Yet it is often helpful to be able to recognize that which is not love ---when it masquerades as love in unloving ways. In the long run genuine acts of love help differing people to be in open and honest dialogue with each --- other to the mutual advantage of all, with justice and love for all. Genuine acts of love promote reconciliation, mutual understanding, and cooperation. Compulsive dedication to specific dogmas, doctrines, statements of faith, rituals, institutional forms, etc. often generate alienation and violence. Such dedication, no matter how sincere and self-sacrificial, is not among the most nobel aspects of love. Such dedication all too often degenerates into denials of the complementary affirmations of other people, and to refusals to be in dialogue with people who offer complementary affirmations. Such dedication does not help people to be in open and honest dialogue with each other to the mutual advantage of all with justice and love for all. It is not enough to be "right". The essence of "righteousness" is not to be "right"; but rather to be right with people who differ significantly from you. The essence of "righteousness" is reconciliation, the promotion of open and honest dialogue. The essence of "righteousness" is not the earning of credits through conformal behavior according to some prescription of what constitutes proper behavior. The "last judgment" will not be based upon any criteria which we know of in advance. The criteria will be a surprise to all involved in the last judgment. We can not conform ourselves to meet the criteria of the last judgment. (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in www.essayz.com Search for Integrity and Honesty (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================
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