In order to love, I think it absolutely necessary to believe in God

  • Thread starter Thread starter JVSantos
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
J

JVSantos

Guest
In order to love, I think it absolutely necessary to believe in God.
Your thoughts…
 
Well, if God didn’t exist, we wouldn’t be here, so yes.

And to answer the original question, you can love without believing in God.
 
Without loving God first, it remains a disordered love. God, our creator, is to be loved above all created things, including those we hold most dear.
 
stephe1987 said:
Well, if God didn’t exist, we wouldn’t be here, so yes.
Click to expand...
Yes, but, I am coming in from the understanding that God is pure and absolute love himself. Oh, how glorious this truth is!!! Praise be to God!

Having been made in his image, we have the capacity to love and be loved. But, it is as po18guy wrote, it is a disordered love and less intense and pure and perfect than it could be and this, due to the fall of man and our sins. This is not to say that even if we believe in God and love God; that our love experiences are not disordered - but, we try and will die trying.

But, we can all experience love because God let’s his light and love illuminate us and gives us life without prejudice - just like the rain.

Matthew 5:43 -48

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor* and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.*
 
You are right about needing to love God in order to really love others. We can have attraction to others, but without the love of God that attraction is bound to be impure and so fragile as to be easily broken by the vicissitudes of life. I have seen it many times. The marriages that are hardest to break up are the ones in which both parties have a real (as opposed to an artificial) love of God. That doesn’t mean atheists can’t have long lasting marriages. I know some who have. But if the sinking point arrives, what life raft do atheists have to grab onto without God there to buoy them up?

In my first marriage both of us had become atheists. The marriage lasted ten years but was really over after five. In retrospect, I believe atheism had unglued us from each other. In my second marriage my wife and I were both Catholic. Faith has done more than anything in my first marriage could do to help us be bonded not only in our love for God, but also for each other. I often wonder how our first marriage would have fared if we had both found a real love of God in our hearts.

“Just as thieves do not lightly attack a place where they see royal weapons prepared against them, so he who has grafted prayer into his heart is not easily robbed by the thieves of the mind.” St. Mark the Monk
 
Consider these two statements.
  1. I never knew what real worry was until I had children.
  2. Someone without children can not know what worry is.
If you understand the difference between them, you might understand why this post is so offensive.
 
I have to disagree with the opening post. It is possible to love without believing in God. I am an example of that: I love my family and my wife and have no belief in any god or gods.

A few of you expressed that without belief in God, love is somehow diminished. How you are able to make this assessment? Love is a subjective feeling and you have no way of really knowing how I, or any other non-believer, feels about another person. There is no way to compare your feelings of love as believers, to my feelings as a non-believer since neither of us are able to feel each others feelings in order to compare.

Charlemagne II probably has the most insight as he has been married as both an atheist and a Catholic, but this is only one person. I can point to many examples of long and happy atheist marriages. Also, although he may feel a deeper love in his current marriage than in his previous marriage, we can’t be sure that this stems from belief; it may just as easily be because his current wife is a much better match, or other factors.

I think it is very presumptuous to declare that someone else’s love is somehow lesser than yours when you have no way of experiencing their feelings and comparing it to yours.
 
Love flows from God, who pours forth His very life into the world in creation, in sustaining creation, and through the sacraments. It is God who urges us on to continue loving, our neighbors, ourselves, our God, especially when it is not so easy. Love does not necessarily feel so good BUT it is what gets us out of the bed in the morning and keeps us dedicated to the work we must do each day. 😉
 
Come on, it’s almost offensive to say that someone who doesn’t believe in God cannot love!

My parents are agnostic; does that mean they don’t love me?

I think Christianity opens up to us a new degree of love, because we see the value of persons in a new light. This is called charity; and though it is a special kind of love, it manifests itself through the natural kinds of love. Grace elevates nature. Someone who believes and allows God into his soul can potentially love other people to a whole new degree; just look at the saints.

But notice that I said “potentially”. The fact that one is a Christian doesn’t mean he is good or more loving than anyone else. The question is how much he allows his faith and hope to transform him.
 
Orvl

*Charlemagne II probably has the most insight as he has been married as both an atheist and a Catholic, but this is only one person. *

In matters such as these, one has to go from one’s experience.

But one also has to go from one’s experience and one’s faith. The idea of atheists that their love is as good as anyone else’s is their experience. But if there is a God, and they don’t love their God, they truly are missing an important foundation for their human love, even if they do feel they are missing anything. Sorry if that sounds offensive, but it’s my belief and this is a Catholic forum where Catholics are allowed, if not allowed anywhere else, to express their beliefs.

Atheists can certainly be married to each other and be satisfied and convinced that their love is as good as it gets, but there’s no proof that it’s so. If they both converted to Christ, they just *might *find that it’s even better. 🙂 But that could only be so if they are truly Christian in the heart and not just on their lips.
 
JVSantos said:
Love flows from God, who pours forth His very life into the world in creation, in sustaining creation, and through the sacraments. It is God who urges us on to continue loving, our neighbors, ourselves, our God, especially when it is not so easy. Love does not necessarily feel so good BUT it is what gets us out of the bed in the morning and keeps us dedicated to the work we must do each day. 😉
Click to expand...
And because Love flows from God, like rain that falls on the good and the bad equally, His love flow whether believe in Him or not. Only is severe case would one not respond lovingly to the Law of Love that has been placed in our hearts. Belief is not required to love, however belief is required for holiness.
 
JVSantos said:
In order to love, I think it absolutely necessary to believe in God.
Your thoughts…
Click to expand...
One would have to define the terms very precisely: that is, what you mean by “love,” “believe,” and “G-d.” Then one can analyze the logical connection between them.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top