The Power of Love

 

VOTE  2020  

Election Reflection

As members of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) in the United States we invite you to join us in our 2020 Election Reflection Process, Towards a More Perfect Union.  Each week until Election Day, November 3rd, we will highlight a reflection and dialogue theme.  This week’s Election Reflection is entitled, The Power of Love.  Please pray, reflect and dialogue along with us.

Towards a More Perfect Union

The Power of Love 

Scripture

May they all be one as You are in me and I am in You; may they be one in us... (John 17:21)

Reflection 

“I do not think of political power as an end. Neither do I think of economic power as an end. They are ingredients in the objective that we seek in life,” wrote Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., “Our goal is to create a Beloved Community and this will require a qualitative change in our souls as well as a quantitative change in our lives.

According to The King Center, for Dr. King the Beloved Community was not a lofty utopian ideal… Rather, the Beloved Community was for him a realistic, achievable goal...

Dr. King’s Beloved Community is a global vision, in which all people can share in the wealth of the [E]arth. In the Beloved Community, poverty, hunger and homelessness will not be tolerated. Racism and all forms of discrimination, bigotry and prejudice will be replaced by an all-inclusive spirit of sisterhood and brotherhood...Love and trust will triumph over fear and hatred. Peace with justice will prevail...

The core value of the quest for Dr. King’s Beloved Community was agape love...which he described as “understanding, redeeming goodwill for all,” an “overflowing love which is purely spontaneous, unmotivated, groundless and creative”…”the love of God operating in the human heart.” He said that “Agape does not begin by discriminating between worthy and unworthy people…It begins by loving others for their sakes” and “makes no distinction between a friend and enemy; it is directed toward both… Agape is love seeking to preserve and create community.”

(The King Center, “The King Philosophy,” downloaded 8/28/20.)

Music

I Am Willing (Holly Near) (Lyrics)

Questions for Reflection and Dialogue

Think about a social movement that has unfolded during your lifetime--the civil rights movement, the women’s rights movement, etc. To what extent have I experienced these movements as fueled by “the power of love”?

What kinds of “qualitative change in our souls as well as a quantitative change in our lives” are necessary if we are to build King’s Beloved Community and enflesh God’s dream that all might be one?

  

Closing Prayer

God of all, in this year of election, in these days of discernment, IGNITE us with fire of your love. ENFLAME our hearts with courage to embrace dialogue that transforms and truth that frees. KINDLE our love with kindness to heal divisions and reconcile relationships. LIGHT our imaginations with insight to envision and create a world where all are one. STIR our actions with justice and peace to engage critical concerns and cherish all of life. FIRE our lives with audacity and hope to risk all for God’s mission. -- Roxanne Schares, SSND