God Sustains His Love in the Human Person
With the love with which he [God] eternally and infinitely loves himself, he mercifully deigns to nourish me. With such … nourishment, … he destroys in me every vestige of earthly and profane love, and lets his love live in me, be in me, operate in me. (OOCC, X, p. 453; STA, 494)
God is Love Eternal. Godhead is a communion of persons who are eternally in love with each other. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are the three persons involved in the Godhead. The Father loves the Son, the Son loves the Father and the love of the Father and the Son is the Holy Spirit. Hence, God is a community of love. In this community, there is mutual appreciation of each other and reciprocal support to each other in order to accomplish their respective functions within and outside the Trinity. According to St. Vincent Pallotti, God communicates and nourishes the human person with the same divine love. When a person is nourished by God’s love, he is totally overwhelmed by the love of God. The love of God takes hold of him and every form of earthly and profane love is totally destroyed. With the destruction of earthly and profane forms of love in the life of a person, the love of God lives in him, remains in him, and operates in him. With the presence of God’s love within a person, he remains in God and God remains in him. Thus, for St. Vincent, with God and his love residing in a person, he is able to love others with the very same love with which God loves him.
Is my love for others truly Trinitarian? Is there mutual appreciation and reciprocal support in my love for others? Am I nourished by the love of God? Is the presence of God and his love in me an antidote to earthly and profane love in my life? Does God’s love in me help me to love others with the very same love with which God loves us?
Whoever is without love does not know God for God is love … We have come to know and believe in the love God has for us. God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him. (I Jn. 4: 8, 16)