tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5356114186987252972.post1410687177533074571..comments2024-03-28T13:26:20.672-04:00Comments on The Closet Professor: Agape and OptimismJoehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05299122685163501819noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5356114186987252972.post-37837311175008065332016-12-11T07:47:53.735-05:002016-12-11T07:47:53.735-05:00Appreciate this post. Only recently discovered you...Appreciate this post. Only recently discovered your blog. One comment on agape love. One reason Christians get negative is in understanding the diversity and multiplicity of God's love, and think of phileo, eros, agape as three different kinds of love. The words are useful for descriptions of how love is variously known and expressed, but separating them out and often seeing them in opposition does great damage. Much of the difficulty is with eros, as if it is essentially self-serving and the opposite of agape as self-giving. Eros of course has a great deal to do with sex and sexuality, but is much broader. It is that experience of love when we perceive--in no particular order, this is a rambling stream of consciousness--diversity, beauty, delight in color, find enjoyment in art, hobbies, passion to do our work, in recreation and athletics, in walks through woods, noticing and delighting in the myriad of form, color all about us. All of that is context for what we do in bed, but the erotic is not and does not need to be solely focused on genital activity as the goal. All these other expressions of eros are, can, and should be ends in themselves. There is of course a dangerous side to eros, when it demands everything for oneself, whether that is in sex or on the job, unrestrained promiscuity, misuse or abuse of environment and other parts of the created world, strictly for the self without regard for the other whether the other is another human, animals, plants, etc.<br /><br />On the other hand agape also has a dangerous side, something Christians misunderstand. If a battered spouse (regardless of the coupling--same gender, other gender, or even in nonsexual relationships) allows the other (husband, wife, partner, "friend") to bully, demean, physically harm, etc. and the sufferer accepts that in the name of agape,that is a totally misunderstanding of agape. To stay in a battering relationship in order to change the abuser, or to submit to the abuse in the name of some higher good is a perversion of agape, just as much as it is a perversion of eros to be in a succession of one-night stands, without regard for relationship or the welfare of the other. As a retired pastor, I'm simply reflecting on what I've seen in my years of ministry. Thanks very much for your blog. I am a straight man, happily married for 54 years, and appreciate your integrative thoughts. Appears that you see and delight in a unitive world view and universe and reject the destructive dualistic thought that pervades so much of our culture. Best wishes and thanks again. RichardRichard Lichtyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06915869566505575960noreply@blogger.com