Is unconditional love possible?

Fr. Leo Pabayo .

WE have often heard of the phrase “unconditional love.”` In the Gospel according to Matthew (5:43-48), our Lord talks about what “unconditional love” really means.  It means God does not take away blessings to man that no matter what the sin of man is. God is forever generous. This Gospel passage tells us that the mercy of God is first clearly evident first in the material blessings that he gives us every day which even the worst of sinner enjoys. “He makes his sun to rise on both the wicked and the good, and gives rain to both the just and the unjust.”

Christ therefore says that since we are blessed by God’s grace, which the unconditional love of God for us, we also ought to practice unconditional love to our neighbor. This makes us a true disciple of his.

In another Gospel passage, Jesus says something similar about God. God does not condemn. He is always merciful. All that is needed by man is to turn his back on evil and take the good road in life. This good road is strewn is with blessings from God.

God’s generosity is beyond our ability to understand. He has made himself incapable of not loving us, as Pope Francis would say.

Christ spoke again and again of God the Father’s ineffable mercy to us sinners through the devotions promoted by the saints to lead sinners back to God. The most well-known devotion that has flowered in recent times is the devotion to the divine mercy as promoted by St. Faustina. This is really another form of devotion the merciful heart of Jesus. Man who has experienced his sinfulness could always take refuge in the heart of Christ which is promoted in the devotion to the Divine Mercy and the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Man, because of his sins, is in a pitiful state which St. Paul has made us aware of in one of his letters to the Church communities under his care. He says that he has found in himself a tendency to do what is bad. He says that it is only by the grace of God what he is able to transcend this. He trusts in the grace of Christ to enable him to overcome his sinful tendencies.

He preaches to those who try to live good lives and tells them not to be satisfied with their efforts to live good lives but pushes them to go further, that is, to also practice unconditional love to their fellowmen and women. He then calls on them to “be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.” Obviously we cannot be perfect the way God is. But Jesus challenges us to bring to perfection the virtues God has endowed us with as human beings.

To be perfect is a goal that God has intended for us to reach in our life. In our actual situation now, it is but something devoutly to be wished but we do not think we can practice. But as the Lord said, “With God nothing is impossible.” The time will come when we would be able to have the perfection that God has meant for us as human beings. We have been given the Holy Spirit who enables us to also practice unconditional love and have our little share of the perfection of God.