A new approach to the way I search for the meaning of agapé began 7 years ago. I gathered quotes from as many authors as I could find. These quotes were entered into a notebook that had a brown, leather cover.
But as I copied quotes I would alter them whenever I came across the author’s use of the word ‘love’ when I sensed that the word was being used in a spiritual way or had an underlying spiritual meaning. I would change the word to ‘agapé.’
As I continued doing that year after year, I began to realize that a profound meaning developed in those quotes. This deepening of understanding helped me become aware of the power of agapé in my life and in my relationships.
As I continued doing that year after year, I began to realize that a profound meaning developed in those quotes. This deepening of understanding helped me become aware of the power of agapé in my life and in my relationships.
At the same time that I was altering quotes from authors, I continued to deepen the meaning of agapé in my own daily meditation exercises and in the actions of living, and relationships. In this combined process I began to find my life being changed as I opened up to an agapic perspective on life.
Now, I will devote the next 17 posts in this section of my blog as my response to all of that searching. But I’ll start here with only a few quotes before I devote each posting to a lengthy series of quotes from one book. And of course, although the word ‘agape’ is not used, in those places where ‘love’ is used in a spiritual way that the meaning is ‘agape,’ the word was changed to ‘agape.’
ST. IGNATIUS (from Spiritual Exercises) “Agape is shown more in deeds than in words.”
In the book, A Year of Living Prayerfully, Jared Brock recorded an interview he had with POPE FRANCIS. The following quote from that interview is from a description of prayerfully holding someone ‘in the light’:
“I’m excited for what God is going to do in her life.
“There’s no more hatred or animosity. Only agape that I could never muster or conjure up on my own. I feel God’s agape toward a former enemy. I feel what Christ felt on the cross.”
BROTHER LAWRENCE resolved to make agape the end of all his actions.
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