“Love is . . . “ 1 Cor. 13

“The madness of two”. That’s what the title means. I saw it Sunday night on a bottle of Chardonnay that I bought to share with friends over dinner. I thought at first it meant “The Folly of God.” Goes to show how much French I know. My friends and I talked about that name for a wine. Why did the vintners name it such? Did they think they were mad for starting a winery? Did it make them especially jovial when they drank it together? What was it?

Folie a Deux has stuck with me this Valentine’s Day week, but in a different context; one of love. Truly, love is folly, in both senses of the word. The love that two people share can take the form of a frolic, or fun, maybe even be a bit absurd, in a healthy way. It can also take the form of true madness, more in line with the clinical definition of this phrase, where two people become so co-dependently crazy that they share in one another’s psychosis. Both of these understandings can easily exist within one relationship between two people.

The madness of the love between two can also apply to Christ and people. Only God would be mad (crazy in a good way?) enough to choose to show love by taking on flesh. Love in the flesh, be it by God or humans, is silly and crazy and messy and yes, mad. It’s most frequently NOT those things that Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 13, more often just the opposite; “Love is impatient, unkind, holds grudges, frequently fails . . .” But I guess that’s the nature of love. And that leads me to the second part of this blog—keeping in line with the “two” theme.

I saw this “love letter” on Valentine’s Day. It’s entitled “Dear Human” by Courtney Walsh.

“You’ve got it all wrong. You didn’t come here to master unconditional love. That is where you came from and where you’ll return. You came here to learn personal love. Universal love. Messy love. Sweaty love. Crazy love. Broken love. Whole love, infused with divinity. Love lived through the grace of stumbling. Demonstrated through the beauty of messing up. Often. You didn’t come here to be perfect. You already are. You came here to be gorgeously human. Flawed and fabulous. And then to rise again into remembering. But unconditional love? Stop telling that story. Love, in truth, doesn’t need ANY other adjectives. It doesn’t require modifiers. It doesn’t require the condition of perfection. It only asks you to show up. And do your best. That you stay present and feel fully. That you shine and fly and laugh and cry and hurt and heal and fall and get back up and play and work and live and die as YOU. It’s enough. It’s plenty.”

I might add “It’s madness”. The madness of love. Folie a Deux.