As Yourself

The next few posts will be "penning" some thoughts down. Can I use the term "penning" with an electronic blog?

There is the second half of Christ's two-part law, taught two millennium ago and echoing all through time. The first part is Love God, with all your heart, all your strength and all your soul. Checked.

The second part is Love your neighbor as yourself. I know "neighbor" is any other human being, past, present and future. Yes, even Osma bin Laden and Hitler. But the "as yourself" part stuck in my mind for years.

It wasn't until very recently that I came to admit to myself, that I didn't love myself. It's hard to file for a divorce from myself, so I had to find a way to reconcile this.

I didn't love myself because I believed all those negative connotations the world taught me since I could barely walk and talk. I was unloved. I was unwanted. I was outcast. Even God could not love a sinner like myself - thank you 16 years of Catholic education!!!

I loved others - all my life. But I have always loved them far more than I loved myself. I was always the expendable one, the despised, the one people would turn to when they needed help, then cast aside like a useless tool when they did not. This also was how I came to define myself.

So how could I love my neighbor as myself - if I never could love myself?

It wasn't until recently, that I started to look at those words with a different perspective. While I still believe God wants us to love ourselves, the words are "Love your neighbor as yourself," not "Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself." Isn't that the same thing? Maybe not.

"As yourself" can mean "as much as yourself." But it can also mean that your neighbor IS yourself. In other words, those that we see around us, those we interact with, those who we can harm, or help, or heal.... are a part of ourselves.

"Humanity is One" is a message that has echoed in my mind for decades now. The way I've come to understand the Bride of Christ is the same. It's not the church, nor a selection of people. It is our neighbor as ourselves. Some of the images for the bride echo that as well. Our neighbors - all of humanity - as one. 

Love is the glue that holds us all together and binds us as one. And when we work together, we achieve far more than the sum of our individual efforts.

What potential lies within humanity, we have yet to discover...

Hand-in-hand we are called to be

That is the design of humanity

Love your neighbor

AS YOURSELF.

... and SHINE!