As an analytic philosopher, I had to
explore the sort of interactions which promote the quest for intimacy in depth
and detail. And that compulsion was
magnified when I realized (1) that love is simply a process of letting another
person into my life, (2) that this process can deepen if, and only if, I learn
how to interact passionately, vulnerably, respectfully and faithfully, and (3)
that my socialization was dominated by languages generated by a metaphor of
power and judgment, not a metaphor of intimacy.
Here, I seek to show that these four characteristics of intimate
interactions, though distinguishable, operate inseparably.
My conviction that passion is a crucial
component of intensely personal responses to other individuals was crystallized
by my encounter with Heidegger and Sartre.
Prior to that encounter, my indoctrination in Scholastic theology had
inclined me to view passion and desire as disruptive forces which must be
subjected to the rule of reason, and I simply assumed that reason functioned as
a detached, disinterested, dispassionate and god-like perspective on language,
experience and reality. My introduction
to Heidegger threw new light on Nietzsche's thesis that the rationalist
tradition was propelled by a will to power.
More importantly, Heidegger exposed the sterility of forms of life which
fostered detachment, To bolster his
critique of rationalism, he devised a hermeneutical theory designed to center
an authentically human existence in two passions, Angst (anxiety, dread) and Sorge
(care, trouble, worry), rather than in reason.
As the twentieth century heir of Cartesian
rationalism, Sartre was determined to wrest authority from Hegel, the
quintessential rationalist. To that end,
he linked the fusion of passion and reason in Hegel's god-term, the conception
of an unbounded consciousness, with his own fusion of Descartes' solipsistic
thinking being and Kant's abstract conception of the autonomous
individual. The result can be found in
his use of a metaphor which depicted unique individuals as passions for the
infinite and his argument that, since they are therefore futile projects to be
God, human existence is absurd and even obscene. Then, as he worked out the implications of
this metaphor, Sartre concluded (1) that indifference therefore requires a
callous decision to insulate oneself from the possibility that the cries of
another might evoke a personal response, (2) that this decision must be
constantly remade, and (3) that the resulting stance is a flight from an
authentically human existence.
Since I was beginning to realize that love
involves letting another person into my life, Sartre's analyses of passionate
interactions between individuals exposed the ways that my efforts to retain
control over my life aborted or distorted my longing for intimacy. As I learned that lesson, I began to see that
love and indifference function as polar opposites in everyday English. Love involves letting another person into my
life with at least a dim awareness that interactions between us will tap every
feeling in me, including deeply buried pain, anger, fear and shame, while a
stance of indifference requires judgments and strategies which justify my
habitual desire for self-sufficiency and control over my life.
My understanding of the workings of these
polar opposites was increased when I asked the students in my course on
Christian marriage: "What is the opposite
of love?" I wanted them to
answer: "Indifference." Almost without exception, they answered: "Hatred." As I probed that answer, I began to see the
revelatory power of this polar opposition.
Love is not a feeling. As the
surrender of control over my life, it is a willingness to experience pain,
anger, fear, shame, care, compassion, joy and playfulness. In that same vein, hatred is not a
feeling. Rather, it is a tangled
response in which anger chokes off the expression of all other feelings.
To make this point in class, I would ask,
with mock innocence: "What are
children feeling when they tell their mothers that they hate them?" Invariably, I received the answer: "Anger and frustration." Then, to show how buried anger distorts
communication, I would recount my experience with engaged couples whose teasing
was warm, affectionate and playful. But
when they had been married for a number of years, their teasing had a barb in
it, since buried feelings inevitably find hidden expression. And I would then insist that, if all feelings
cannot be vulnerably and respectfully expressed, soon all are distorted.
In the final analysis, intimate
interactions will always be flawed, but even events that bring out the worst in
us can be brought back into the process.
On its part, the process calls for the honest recognition that lapses
into self-protective or self-aggrandizing exercises of power or judgment do
violence to those who have entered into a passionate and vulnerable involvement
with me. In sum, each such lapse is an
attempt to be invulnerable which encodes a massive mistrust of my loved ones.
A growing awareness of the violence that I
had done to others as a young priest taught me that vulnerability, respect and
fidelity were inseparably intertwined in the process which yielded deepening
person-to-person involvements. I had
accepted, uncritically, the theology which asserted that the Sacraments
operated ex opere operato
(automatically, without human involvement).
As a result, I assumed that the marriage ritual, properly performed,
conferred the grace necessary to live the vows faithfully. In effect, I assumed that, regardless of the
crisis, every marriage could be saved.
As a result, I invariably reminded deeply wounded spouses who came to me
for guidance that they had made a commitment, and I had urged them to stay the
course, even if it meant hanging on a cross, like Jesus did.
Today, I no longer assume that God calls a
person to remain vulnerably, respectfully and faithfully involved with someone
who does not and perhaps cannot respond in kind. In the past, I had called them to hang on a
cross, not for three hours, but day in and day out, for the rest of their
lives. Now, I do not tell anyone what to
do, but I hope to aid them in discerning whether God is calling them to leave
or stay. And I know that someone can
leave a marriage with integrity only if they have grieved over what was and
what might have been.
From experiences like these, I learned that
love is not a feeling, but a passionate involvement in which every feeling can
be tapped. From my own experience, I
learned the hard way that, to transform my longing for intimacy into a
realizable quest, I had to learn how to be honest about what I thought and felt,
real or imagined. From the start, tangled
interactions revealed that I was involved with a stranger and that I was also a
stranger to myself. And since
trust-issues had plagued me since infancy, I found it difficult to voice
vulnerable self-revelations in a way that put them in another's care without
burdening the beloved with expectations.
But that difficulty taught me (1) that failures to express what I felt
and thought honestly deprived me of self-respect and (2) that expectations (and
judgments) are inherently disrespectful.
In sum, without vulnerability, no respect, and without respect, no
vulnerability. And without a hard-won
trust that my loved ones will be there even when my flawed reactions wound them
or expose their vulnerability, I cannot long remain vulnerably and respectfully
involved.
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