Why is it that those who love each other the most often hurt each other the most?

   I wondered this when a longtime friend shared a recent encounter. Not only is she an incredibly loving mother, but her three children love her the way all parents want to be loved. 

   One day, one of her adult children suddenly drew a long-sheathed sword of resentment and spoke it into her soul.  "It was the most hurtful thing anyone has ever said to me," she told me, without repeating the toxic words. "I love him so deeply and I know he loves me. Why would he say such a terrible thing?"

   It took my friend months to recover. But, real Love, if given the chance, will always cure the pain of earthly love.

   "We're fine now," she told me, "maybe even better than before. I made the mistake of thinking it was about me. It wasn't. I think this kind of thing happens to people who truly care for each other."

   Really? Why would you or I hurt someone we love?

   The Apostle Peter, the "rock" upon which the Catholic church is built, denied he even knew the Christ who he claimed to love the most. And he denied him not only once but, as Jesus predicted, three times.

   Love's question becomes not can we avoid hurting those we love the most. The challenge is whether we can let Love mend the rips we sometimes tear in the fabric of our most precious relationships.

   To do so means to bury the tools of counter-attack and revenge you may have spent years honing. The soul is not repaired by sharp weapons but by burying weapons altogether. 

   The love you practice is weighed down by demands of the world. That is why only God's Love can heal the wounds sometimes inflicted by earthly love. 

   You and I knew that already. But, we can so often forget. Even Jesus, on the cross, wondered how it could be that God would forsake him. 

   Then he remembered. God is Love. 

-Erie Chapman