Love becomes violent whenever love is conditional. Quite like religious folks who tell you how much they love you but let all of their words drip with commands to be and act differently. It is a love that is much like bait. It hangs out there and tries to draw you into its sweet smelling images of smiling faces and words of encouragement. But like bait, it is meant to catch you - put an end to you - serve you up to the others as a catch of the day - for Jesus' sake of course. This baiting-love is always violence that attempts to corrupt the foundation of the love that is to be a self-giving, self-sacrificing love that does not coerce or trick or demean or shame or embarrass. Love that is the creative love of God that has been shown to be pruned of its violence never makes room for violence - any kind of violence.
It is good to stand silently and listen to how violent love manifests itself in the small megaphones that treat people to an endless rampage of words that seek to make a wreck of the souls of men and women who - within the grace of God - choose to live within the freedom to care for their bodies and thoughtfully consider the the many facets of responsible human life. The violence is sharp each time the name of the Prince of Peace is used as a hammer to shatter rather than heal. The violence is vulgar each time the vision of the Prophets - whose words rise up to honor all humanity without partiality - is left dangling without completing the vision - thus left as a word raped of its character. The violence is idolatrous each time it is used to shape young children into con-spirators who must listen to the self-secured voices that completely lack the breath or Spirit of God's endless,bountiful, and hopeful, creativity.
Unfortunately, love becomes violent under the cover of love. The violence is smeared all over the words that say we love you and we will love your child. For not a bit of that line is true - nor will it be. It is a weapon that attempts to take the life of another person and shape it into the life of those who give voice to their own wants and needs. A person who does not take hold of the love that rolls through the fence line is rejected - lectured - shouted down. Even as it rolls off the lips of those who claim to embody God's love - they forget that their love already smells of hatred and scorn and, yes, violence. It is not at all to be associated with God's love.
I usually stand at a distance when I see and hear love becoming violence. There is a fence. There are small shrubs. There are infant trees. There are even rules - civic rule - that are meant to keep all that loving-violence at a distance so that such antics do not create physical violence and harm. This love that becomes violence looks like our world. It is pushy - it is loud - it is vile - it shames - it encourages disrespect. Some escorts at other facilities find no room between these expressions of violent love (which is an oxymoron) and the people they serve. They are so close to clients they can feel how such violent love cuts and whips and, yes, crucifies clients who enter and leave clinics. Those who say they seek to rescue the unborn - and try to do it with holy words and images - merely repeat the ongoing violence of a violent world. I must bow in admiration of the people who escort those delicate souls who must take the lashing of tongues and the threat of bodily contact that can wound and kill. I am able to stand at a distance but others must be a buffer even when there appears to be no room for a buffer.
I find it difficult to purge myself of violence. Anger can be flicked on like a switch. Hate can rise up faster than any consideration to love. And yet, it is necessary. It is also necessary to put a name to the violence that defiles love's endless solidarity with any and all - without judgment or condemnation. So, we must escort one another into and through the decision of life the too many people find threatening. I find love to be an amazing power of creativity in which even my enemy - or those who will not be as I want them to be - will find time to dance and sing together. Some may say I'm a dreamer.
TRRR
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