English
EspañolWhat is a symptom of a truthful kind of love? It is tenderness.
Text
“Against this backdrop of love so central to the Christian experience of marriage and the family, another virtue stands out, one often overlooked in our world of frenetic and superficial relationships. It is tenderness… “I have calmed 20 and quieted my soul, like a child quieted at its mother’s breast”.”
(The Joy of Love, n.28)
Commentary
In times such as these, of rushed, ephemeral and frantic relationships and superficial and even empty, do not be discouraged. If you genuinely want to love, discover what your intimate loving relationships are asking for in order to live and grow. Discover the time and space they need, and then, generously and tenderly, give it to them. You shall reap great fruit. What is crucial for the Twenty-first Century family is having enough time and opportunities to “be a family.”
The current lifestyle of society is forcing many marriages to “be and do the bare minimum” within their families. Unknowingly, they have no time for the most intimate and important part of life and love. In these cases, they feel empty, sad, and lonely. They may experience the “loneliness that comes from being internally empty” and the “emptiness that comes from being alone.”
Denying time and space to each loving relationships within our families and introducing a frantic rush and superficial relationships in our family impedes the birth and growth of the gems contained in deep self-giving and embracing. These gems are the tenderness, trust, and intimate companionship, the silence filled with ineffable feeling, the inner peace of knowing we are loved and wanted in our home, in the unconditional shelter where stripped of everything, we are still worth it all.
