Valentine's Day is one of my favorite holidays. The red and pink, the hearts, the flowers, the chocolate, the celebration of love in so many forms. When I was teaching, I was able to indulge in a fair amount of Valentine silliness and frippery. Science-themed valentines for all my students ("we attract like opposite charges" or "you're the net force that makes my heart accelerate") and heading up the rose and candy-gram fundraiser. Teaching was a labor of love, and I like to believe most of my students experienced that love from me, whether manifest in my time spent tutoring them, encouraging comments on a test, my attendance at their events, or innumerable treats.
It's the romantic love, eros, that gets all the hype this time of year, but why should other forms get the short shrift? Familial love admittedly gets some of its own days (e.g. Mother's Day, Father's Day), but what of friendship? Of affection? These are the loves that don't get the kind of attention from the floral and greeting-card industry, which is unfortunate. Yes, the cynics may say that they don't need a specific day in which to tell their loved ones what they think. And they're right, to an extent. But, if we don't need the corporations reminding us to love generously on a mid-February day, why are we so stingy with our love the other 364 days? What if we loved our coworkers, our neighbors, our students, our teachers, our friends, and strangers with such abandon and recklessness and extravagance every day?
It is the greatest commandment, after all. And an extremely lofty one. It's scattered throughout the Gospel, but the translation that resonates right now is found in John 13. "So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples."
We are leading up to a celebration of the ultimate expression of the ultimate love. The self-sacrificing love that God expressed - nay, that God is - in sending His own Son to atone for our transgressions. And that is the model we are commanded to follow. So let us, this Valentine's Day, be challenged to accept a love beyond measure, and to express a love that exceeds our own capabilities.
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