Love Expounded - Both Choice AND Feeling

Love is a choice…but it is also a feeling state. Humans need to understand and embody both! The concept of human love is both abstract and concrete and can be divided into four categories: storge (affection), philia (friendship), eros (romance), and agape (sacrifice). The Greeks had four words to describe the dimensions and types of human love. In contrast, modern society has but one word to communicate a broad spectrum of emotions, thoughts, behaviors, and relationships that are the visible signs of love. The psychological sciences and philosophy can help to delineate the concept of love to align with theology. Addressed here is the unity of agape and eros to help further define human love in its completeness. These “types” of love  will be further explored and related to the known concepts of love in the biological and psychological sciences.

When the Church teaches the Biblical truth that love is a choice, the teaching is incomplete without referencing the “type” of love addressed. Eros, the most questioned of the types of love, is the most heavily contested within church teachings, particularly in light of the cultural teachings of the “free love” (meaning love with no consequence and absent of mindful choice) that is seemingly endowed as a human right. Eros is a romantic love that comes to its fullest expression in a marital relationship between a man and a woman. This type of love is a mystery because it comes on as a strong feeling and attraction beyond cognitive reasoning. Since humans have a body and bodily sensations, love, in this capacity, is experienced in the sensations of the body and mind. It is ecstasy, overpowering and wonderful. In the neuropsychological sciences, love is partly defined as the release of oxytocin (the love hormone). This, however, is just one dimension of explanation. Though this hormone can be measured in the body and the sensation delineated in thought, the mystery of this experience is attributable to the divine. The how and why of the bodily sensation of love can never truly be measured because it is an endowment of the divine. This gift of sensation is reserved for humans. The Greeks believed that eros’s capacity to “overpower reason” was a sort of “divine madness.” When united with agape, eros finds its full expression of the divine. The “feeling” state cannot be denied.

Agape love is the type of love that is most explicated in church teachings. Agape refers to a sacrificial love that engages freedom and reason. In this way, agape love refers to the correct actions taken for the good of another, regardless of feelings. When united to agape love, humans are united to Christ and his mission. Unity to the mission and mind of Christ allows humans to reason through actions with conscious, cognitive minds and to take action for the good while simultaneously being aware of the feeling state that accompanies action. This process, in the neuropsychological sciences, is called neuro-integration. This type of cognitive integration that unites feelings, thoughts, and actions, is the foundation of mental health.

Pope Benedict XVI says it best, “Love is indeed ecstasy,” not in the sense of a moment of intoxication, but rather as a journey, an ongoing exodus out of the closed inward-looking self toward its liberation through self-giving, and thus toward authentic self-discovery and indeed the discovery of God: Whoever seeks to gain his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will preserve it” (Luke 17:33).

It is critical in teachings about love to unite agape and eros and understand both the feeling and choice states of love. God endowed humanity with a capacity for the full expression and embodiment of his love, which is not absent of bodily sensations but instead fully expressed through the body and mind when united to Him. Understanding how “choice” is united with "feeling,” a both/and relationship instead of an either/or relationship is important to consider when teaching about love. Seeking love for love’s sake is not Biblical, serving others and enjoying the fullness of what that service brings is the unity of agape and eros.

References

Aristotle., & Apostle, H. G. (1966). Metaphysics.. Bloomington, Indiana University Press.

Benedict Pope., XVI 2005b. Deus caritas est. http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-svi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20051225_deus_est.html.

Benedict, Pope., XVI 2009. Caritas in veritate. http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20090629_caritas-in-veritate.html.

The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2011). Hendrickson. (Original work published 1611).

Siegel, D.J. (2017). Mind: A Journey to the Heart of Being Human. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.