Good News Quote #39

From Chapter Seven, Why You Don't Have to Keep Getting Transformed All the Time: Or, How Virtues Make a Lasting Change in Us.

Genuinely life-changing experiences lead to something more lasting. The key example is conversion to Christ, which changes our lives not because it's such an intense experience -- lots of good Christians never have an intense conversion experience -- but because it begins the life of faith, in which you are united to Christ, our Bridegroom. Conversion can be a lot like falling in love, leading to the one Christian marriage that is at the basis of all marriage: union with Christ. By the same token, just as falling in love is not necessary to a good marriage, no particular experience at all is necessary for faith in Christ. What matters is believing that his word is true, just like what matters in marriage is believing and keeping the promises you make in your wedding vows.


Nor is it especially important, in either case, to "keep the feeling alive." Feelings come and go -- that's what they're for. They change all the time, because they are about responding to the immediate situation. But over the course of a lifetime they do tend to settle into predictable patterns, such as are found in the virtues and blessings of a good marriage.

Good News Quote #38

From Chapter Seven, Why You Don't Have to Keep Getting Transformed All the Time: Or, How Virtues Make a Lasting Change in Us.

If falling in love is a kind of discovery, then it's not surprising that it happens at the beginning of many relationships. Perhaps there are exceptions, like when old friends fall in love after they've known one another for years, but even then I'd figure that's because they discover something new in each other. In any case, when you make such a discovery it's meant to point in the direction of something more lasting, like the lifetime of love in marriage and the raising of children together that comes from it. Falling in love is a perception that says, "This would be a wonderful person to share a lifetime with, to be the mother or father of my children. If I were to grow old with this person, seeing our children grow up, it would be the fulfillment of my deepest desire on earth.


If I'm right, the importance of falling in love lies not in how it feels, but in what it perceives. And as always with our feelings, the key moral issue is how truthful the perception is. That is why, as I said in chapter 4, I urge my students considering marriage to ask the questions: is this really a good person, someone good for me that I can be good to, someone with whom I could be a good parent? Falling in love is a sign that this might be someone with whom you could make a good marriage. Still, it's not enough, because the feeling is not always as perceptive as it should be. You can fall in love with people who seduce you (seductive people are good at getting you to fall in love with them) or, if you're emotionally unhealthy, you can have a repeated pattern of falling in love with people who are bad for you.