Christ: The Teacher of True Love
We must love as Jesus Christ has loved us. But since Jesus Christ has loved us so much, that with infinite love he accepted death by being nailed to a cross. So, we … must enter [this holy institute] to participate more perfectly in the practice of love towards our neighbor. (OOCC, II, p. 6)
For St. Vincent Pallotti, Jesus Christ is the true teacher of the way of love. The Sacred Heart of Jesus symbolizes the love Jesus has for humankind. Hence, according to St. Vincent, we must love as Christ has loved. The love of Christ must impel us to love God and our neighbor. Christ’s love for us implied that he laid down his life for us by following the way of the cross. Hence, true love calls for laying down one’s life for others, accepting sufferings on oneself for the sake of others and letting oneself go in order to let others in. Thus, true love of God and neighbor, as Jesus teaches us, involves a radical self-surrender. St. Vincent Pallotti visualized the religious institute one joins to serve God as a significant means to live a life of love towards God and neighbor. Hence, he advised anyone who wished to join the community he founded to enter it only if he planned to practice the love of God and neighbor in a perfect manner. Just as in the life of Jesus, in our life too, love must be the key motivating force that underlies every action we do in our life, however small it may be.
Do I acknowledge Jesus as the true teacher of love? Do I take the trouble to understand and experience Jesus in the aspect of love? Am I ready to lay down my life for the good and joy of others? Do I consider my particular way of life a means to love God and others in a perfect manner?
For the love of Christ impels us, once we have come to the conviction that one died for all; … He indeed died for all, so that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. (II Cor. 5: 14-15)