Love Me More

Do you love me more than these? // John 21:15

I flopped onto the couch after another day where the minutes melted into hours. I was spent. But I was at peace and happy. 

I sat amazed at how love mixes with gratitude. The day was my long “thank you” to Mom who sacrificed for us in millions of ways through the years. I had arrived months prior and immediately stepped into an altogether new rhythm. I shuttled Mom to church, doctors, specialists, and physical therapists. And I spent spare moments Googling words from these appointments and researching best practices to help her recover and to support her as she grieved the sudden loss of her husband, our father.

Many things faded into the background as she and I built her days of recovery around Mass and prayers. Useless things could not fit.

At the end of those days, I often felt newly edified as I thought of my family and friends who had been making similar sacrifices for years to raise their families. I was more accustomed to different kinds of sacrifices of religious life, and I was amazed at how the Lord provided this opportunity for me to learn to serve in this way. And it was helpful that my mom is an easy patient!

What enables us to make big adjustments in life? How do we learn that being other-centered is life-giving? What enables us to live through life’s refining fires mostly unperturbed and still be available for the next thing? Love.

We hear those haunting words in the Gospel today: “Simon [Peter], do you love me more than these?” (John 21:15). Saint Peter grew in strength throughout his life and died heroically. Saint Paul stands seemingly unperturbed before his fearsome interrogators in the First Reading today (see Acts 25:13-21). He, too, died a martyr. 

How can we face down our fears? Love. 

The love we know through, with, and in Jesus is not the love the world prescribes: self-focused and self-congratulatory. Our love is turned outward, available to receive all the strength we need from God Who enables us to do all things in Christ.