‘Who Painted February Black?’
DEAR Severius Majiedt, I would like to tell you that I like your column very much. It is refreshing to read and I am one of your ‘regulars’. Your last one, the one that serves as my letter’s header, I found different. I read it twice! Do you know that you used the word ‘love’ 15 times?
This word is probably the one word humans abuse most. How do we understand ‘love’? How did our ‘boss’, Jesus, understood and use it? You, a theologian, should try to explain this word, your column would be a good platform. And because you have a brilliant way with words, people would like to read it – even those of us who ‘know it all’. Please let me say this: As I see it, true love – I do not mean the sexual ‘love’, the lust – grows on the seedbed of trust. It is the only seedbed for love, there is no other. Look at the children, they do not know sexuality, they love their parents because they learned to trust them. And if this trust gets violated repeatedly, the love of the child dies. And so it is in a marriage, two people trust each other and if this trust can be maintained, true love develops over years. You know, Mr. Majiedt, we see this even in animals, pets. If a creature learns that you protect and treat it well and you do not harm it, a sustainable loving relationship is established. Indeed, between humans, this has to be maintained over the decades and if you are old, frail and in need of the help of your children, they have to return what you gave them – it is the basis of a sound family. Does this healthy family still exist in our times? Because ‘love’ is used as a tool by too many – even by businesses around Valentine’s Day and Christmas etc. – the word has lost its true meaning. Yes, you can get almost every woman if you say ‘I love you’ only often enough. But that is not ‘love’. You know it, too. This is dishonesty, lust and nothing else. Of course, young people seldom know this; one has to learn it during your life. And who can teach them this fact if they need the understanding most?If we read John 15, 13, we learn what the ultimate love is. And there are many examples in our Bible to explain the word/notion. In 1. John, 4,17 &18 we read about it too, “there is no fear in love”. And there where is fear, is no love – or I am wrong? I would like to read about this all out of your pen, Sir, you could do it, I am perfectly sure about that. Our young society has to learn much; even our government recognises this fact. So, be our teacher, Mr. Majiedt, please!
Peter R Hager
By email