Gristianism

‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. The second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two precepts hang all the law and the prophets’ (Mathew 22.37, 38, 39, 40). ‘By this all men know that they are my disciples, if ye have love one to another’ (John 13.35) …’He who loveth God loveth his brother also’ (1 John 4.21) …’If any man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar’ (1 John 4.20) …The first thing that takes our attention is the saying of Jesus, ‘Thou shalt love,’ etc. (501-2)

hooks explains how when an individual chooses to love at that moment is when a step is taking forward to ending domination and oppression. To love is a practice of freedom and to help others who are blind to become aware as a community. Liberty is approached when love is approached this is when individuals seeks ways to liberate themselves.” The moment we choose to love we begin to move against domination, against oppression. The moment we choose to love we begin to move towards freedom, to act in ways that liberate ourselves and others. That action is the testimony of love as the practice of freedom” (hooks). Oppression and exploitation is destroyed when love comes in and can only be destroyed when everyone as a community decided to take action. Like in North Dakota when even veterans decide to support. Thousands of veterans from around the country traveled to the standing rock and kneeled down to support the water protesters who have been peacefully protesting. Love won and the so did the protestors because everyone came a whole and

Dr. Martin Luther King has always used his way of explaining love with hate. He says that hate scars the soul. In other words, hating our enemies is hurting us in a way. Yes, it is very hard to turn the other cheek to a person that is being very hateful and disrespectful towards you. However, I believe he is saying do not hate the person, hate their actions. One thing I definitely agree with King is when he said “Loving our enemies is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend” in his writing of Loving Your Enemies. I agree with him because this point does make a lot of sense. If

The book by Nicholas Wolterstorff is written with an aim of showing why love may actually contribute to injustices as opposed to the common belief that benevolenceis good. He goes ahead to allude to the Bible and describe the popular Christian belief of love as Jesus used to teach. He explains that in Christianity love is viewed as having concern for one’s neighbors wellbeing and actually going ahead to help them when faced with problems without expecting anything in return. The writer goes ahead to suggest that the Christians view of benevolence is mistaken because it sometimes undermines justice. He explains using various examples that benevolence often conflicts with justice. Wolterstorff explains that benevolence comes when doing what we feel is good as opposed to what is required of us by justice. He uses the example of South Africa to explain why he feels that love actually contributes to injustice. He explains how the Afrikaners perpetrated injustice in the name of benevolence. The Afrikaners felt that it was good to allow people of different races to live in different parts separately because it would make them feel more comfortable when practicing their culture. The writer concludes by supporting the belief that Jesus was not advocating for pure benevolence but instead advocated for the type of love where we care for others.

“To love we must know each other,” and when we examine ourselves and other, we find more similarities than differences (Dorothy Day). In this community of humans, the love I see show me glimpses of the love God has for us. “It was human love that helped me [Dorothy Day] to understand divine love. Human love… gives us a glimpse of the love of God for man…. [and] we learn to understand the love of God for His creatures (Dorothy Day).”

Luke 6:27-31 is part of Jesus’s sermon on the plain. This passage comes right after Luke’s version of the Beatitudes. It states that we are to love those who we do not like, but it also tells us to let them strike us on the other cheek. This is where the controversy comes from. Is Jesus telling us to let abuse keep happening or not? This is where many people struggle. Many scholars have said that Jesus did not mean to stay in abusive situations, but to not fight back with violence. One of the main scholars of this is Walter Wink, you can find out more about him and his work in the companion curriculum.

Agape love is the highest form of love, charity. It is also love for a greater community. Agape is considered the highest form of love because if a person has strong love for their community then there is nothing that they would not do for them. This is the type of love that sends soldier off to war. There is on age limit to how young a soldier has to be when they have a love like Agape. Marjane Satrapi realized this when she was writing her autobiography, Persepolis, about the events that took place in Iran during the 1980s. When she was a child she developed a love for her country and community that came from her parents. She would often make jokes about the new rules they were having to follow. When talking about the beatings they used to perform she claimed that, “After a little while no one took the torture sessions seriously anymore. As for me, I immediately started making fun of them” (Satrapi 97). Marjane saw the laws that were created as demeaning and wrong. So as a child with love for her community she was fighting back in a childlike was by making light of the rules. When Marjane was in her teen years she was sent to Europe to ensure her safety. While there she tried to separate herself from her past. She tried to partake in the actions of the European teens, but the more she did the less she felt like herself. She felt a pain and emptiness inside her, “The harder I tried to assimilate the more I had the feeling that I was distracting myself from my culture,

"You have heard it said, 'eye for eye, tooth for tooth', but I tell you do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right check, turn to him the other also'. (Matthew 5:38) (powerpoint)

And fight for the cause of God against those who fight against you: but commit not the injustice of attacking them first: verily God loveth not the unjust:

Jesus taught dedication and loving the Lord, your God. Secondly, Jesus taught to love your neighbors as yourself, so that they will combine the Ten Commandments into two. “loving – one approaches what one sees with receptivity and confidence, as one would approach a beloved friend;” and in the Spirituality, Relationship, Meaning, it says, “In the course of their lives people grow in confidence that the love and dignity that God gives them cannot be taken away from them no matter what happens in their lives.” These all talked about love, and the reason why I think that “Love your enemies” is the main idea of Christianity is because God loves everyone unconditionally, and by showing people can love their enemies, people are trying to strive love as God. However, not everyone will love God because people do not realize God's love, and therefore do not know how to love. That is the real love I think. Obviously, compared to love the people around you and love everyone, love enemies is special and wise. 2014 Pew Research Center data show “that's 56 million American adults, up from 36.6 million in 2007.” It showed a lot of people, non-religious, like me, that they may question the same

The bible tells you many times to love one another in different situations. Typically, you must do something nice for someone for them to love you in return. For example you buy a woman flowers, dinner and give her a back massage, some people call this love. Is that what the bible really meant though? The untranslated version of the bible has three categories of love, "Agapao", "Phileo", "Eros". Agapao is basically the love for others and the sake of humanity. If you were to help a needy family who just lost their home in a fire, that would be agapao love, like how God gave his only son for everyone else to live in sin. John 3:16 is a prime example of this love. Phileo love is a more one

Although agape love and altruism both have similar qualities of selflessness, it is important to remember that both also have differences. Dirk van Dierendonck and Kathleen Patterson (2010, 178)—editors of Servant Leadership: Developments in Theory and Research—differentiate the two terms of agape love and altruism in the following manner: Agape love is the “emotional healing” of the community by Christian servant leaders, whereas altruism is the creation of “value for the community” by secular servant leaders (Dennis 2004). While agape love (God’s love) can act as an umbrella term that includes altruism (Selfless acts of humanity), at the same time it should be noted that altruism can never supersede agape love as the former originates from humanity and the latter originates from God. Hence, the former always has the possibility of selfish motivation as the basis for the selfless acts of

In the religion Christianity, devotion is a major theme. In order to be a successful Christian, a person must devote himself or herself to God, loving others and to the law. To start off, in Christianity they must devote themselves to loving god in order to reach salvation. Salvation, to Christians, is life after death with god in heaven. In order to reach salvation, a Christian must commit themselves to the teachings of God and Jesus and follow in their ways. If a person follows their teachings they will be absolved from their sins and go to heaven. To continue, a Christian must devote himself or herself to loving others, including their enemies. “But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). To further express this statement by Matthew, he is saying that the Lord told his disciples to spread their love and not their hatred towards others. This then emphasizes the

I believe that we need to be reminded that there is freedom in love, but with this understanding, we also need to realize that there is an opposite side to freedom – it is imprisonment. If you are not free, you are captive. If you cannot truly love God, yourself or your neighbor, you are not truly free. There is an enemy that 's main purpose is to, "...steal, kill and

The other effect is when someone is loved she/he will feel happy, and the happiness makes humans healthy (The Holy Bible, Proverbs 17:22). The most important effect is that love can change other people into better people that can lead into a better world. All of you should know that love’s enemy is hatred. When love gives so many benefits, hatred gives bad results. One of the different results is love makes peace while hatred can cause a war. All people should know the fact that hating other people is bad, but why many people still hate each other? To love others is not a piece of cake, before humans can love others they need to love themselves, and before they can love themselves rightly they should love God (Matthew 22:37-39). Therefore, the key of loving others is by loving God wholly. In the novel Les Miserables, Jean Valjean who loves Cossette and Javert who hates Jean Valjean give a good example to explain about the different result between love and hate. Jean Valjean got happiness from loving Cossette (Hugo, page 332), while Javert could not feel peace and ended up committing suicide (Hugo, page 284). Jean Valjean used to be a man who was filled with hatred, so he kept stealing and did bad things. But after he was changed by love he tried as good as he can to help people around him and he also quoted “… Love each other dearly always. There is scarcely anything else in the world but that: to love one