Four Loves Module
Four Loves Module
AFFECTION
What are the dangers of affection?
It turns love into a blind love
“Affection can love the unattractive: God and His saints love the unlovable. Affection “does not expect too
much,” turns a blind eye to faults, revives easily after quarrels; just so charity suffers long and is kind and
forgives.”
This could be seen on parents whose love extends even when their son or daughter has committed wrong.
There is still a hint of the desire to defend or at least protect their beloved from attacks from other people.
It tends to be demanding
“The most unlovable parent (or child) may be full of such ravenous love. But it works to their own misery
and everyone else‟s. The situation becomes suffocating. If people are already unlovable a continual
demand on their part (as of right) to be loved – their manifest sense of injury, their reproaches, whether
loud and clamorous merely implicit in every look and gesture of resentful self-pity – produce in us a sense
of guilt (they are intended to do so) for a fault we could not have avoided and cannot cease to commit.”
The affectionate may tend to demand to be loved in return. There is a desire to receive affection as well.
This can be clearly seen among parents who tend to get angry or resentful when ignored by their growing
children. The parents could insist on their objects of affection to receive what they have to offer even if
their objects of affection have changed. D a t e o f S e r v i c e
“For affection is the most instinctive, in that sense the most animal, of the loves; its jealousy is
proportionately fierce.” – C.S. Lewis
Affection tends to make people jealous. This includes when someone we are affectionate with changes or
grows. This includes the jealousy of parents when their children gets married or find their own objects of
affection. The same goes with a person whose friends go out on dates with their other friends.
Checkpoint
To whom or to what are you affectionate to? What made you feel this way towards them? Have you tried to
figure out how this feeling began?
The four loves
FRIENDSHIPS
Further transformations of friendships
Man-Woman Friendships
A man to woman friendships tends to transform into Eros or romance unless they are already committed to
a partner or are physically uninterested in each other. Otherwise the friendship could be easily diffused.
This can also happen in the reverse wherein a romantic relationship could turn into friendship which can
make it lasting and enriching. Consider the friendship of Boaz and Ruth which turned into a romantic
relationship afterwards. (See The Book of Ruth)
Checkpoint
Do you have a clique or barkada? What brought you together? How did you find your best friend in that
group? What set you apart from your clique?
The four loves
ROMANCE
Checkpoint
Have you ever felt Eros? What makes Eros so appealing?
The four loves
CHARITY
God creates the need for Himself, thus enabling us to love Him.
“God, it seems to me, bestows two other gifts: a supernatural Need-love of Himself and a supernatural
Need-love of one another.” – C.S. Lewis
Our desire to find God and be in love with Him is something that has been created by God within us. This
enables us to find satisfaction only in God. We may try to look for it in successful careers, wealth or other
forms of human love, but only the love of God can satisfy our cravings for love. He is after all the author
Checkpoint
Why does it seem to be harder to define God’s love?
How would we explain it to others who are in need of it?