Tag Archives: joy ike

Love Freely

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In today’s reading from Hosea we hear: “I will heal their defection, says the Lord, / I will love them freely.”

God loves freely. We who are made in the image and likeness of God are called to do no less.

In the words of this song by Joy Ike (Wearing Love).

Slow your breathing
No more scheming
Quit competing
Just love

Silly humans that we are though, we limit our God given ability to love, whether it is ourselves, those who annoy us, those who hurt us, those we disagree with, those we just don’t particularly like.

Jesus reiterates this central call to love in today’s Gospel (Mark 12):

One of the scribes came to Jesus and asked him, “Which is the first of all the commandments?” Jesus replied, “The first is this: Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.”

Love God. Love neighbor. Love yourself.

Freely and with our whole heart, soul, mind and strength.

As Joy Ike sings in her song: “All that works is the love that you bring.”

LENT: Wearing Love

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One word keeps coming to me in my prayer these first days of Lent in 2022: Love.

In our first reading today from Leviticus we hear the great commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

I have long wondered if the greatest crisis in our world today isn’t that we don’t realize how much we are, each of us, worthy of love. We are all God’s own beloved. God loved us into being. God calls us to love one another as God has loved us.

This morning I prayed with a booklet created several years ago by a group in my religious Congregation focused on growing in nonviolence. Each week the booklet explores Lent with the Principles of Nonviolence. The principle for the first week of Lent is: Nonviolence chooses love instead of hate.

Our founder Margaret Anna Cusack wrote in 1874: “Force was no longer to be the rule, except, indeed, the force of love.”

In 2020 Philadelphia singer songwriter Joy Ike released a song called “Wearing Love.” It is a song I return to again and again to reground myself on this journey. (It is also good to dance to.)

Slow your breathing
No more scheming
Quit competing
Just love 

And everyone will wonder
You did not go under
You were undercover
Wearing love 

 Keep your words
They won’t fix anything
All that works is the love that you bring

This Lent, and beyond, may I find my ground and center in God’s unconditional love. May I bring the force of that love into my actions and relationships. May I wear love always. Just love.