Nothing More than Feelings

You may remember the 1970s sad love song, "Feelings" by Morris Albert.  Here is an excerpt:

"Feelings, nothing more than feelings,
trying to forget my feelings of love.
Teardrops rolling down on my face,
trying to forget my feelings of love."

I'm sure you can also find this on youtube!  When I graduated from high school, my parents gave me a beautiful wooden jewelry box.  My dad told me that he had chosen it and that it played "Feelings".  It was an especially meaningful gift, because my younger brother was in a 28 day rehab program for alcoholism, so he was not at my graduation or party.  One day after an Al-Anon meeting, I was driving home and started crying like a guest on Barbara Walters' talk show.  The tears would not stop flowing.  For 15 years I had not fully grieved the absence of my brother on that special day.  High school graduation was bittersweet for me, and I went to live with my grandparents that summer before starting college.  I still have the jewelry box, 25 years later!

Recently on a Catholic radio station I heard the program host say that just because you still have feelings regarding a painful situation does not mean that you have not forgiven the person who caused the suffering.  I was relieved to hear this, because I was pretty sure I had forgiven a particular person in my life, but sometimes the hurt would come flooding back.  I just kept praying for the willingness to forgive and for the healing of my broken heart.

Feelings are transitory, and they actually have little to do with Love.  If we read 1 Corinthians 13, we learn that Love is not a  feeling, but rather a state of being.  Please allow me to be an English nerd for a moment.  After the word Love in this Bible passage, the word is (or is not) always follows.  Love is patient, love is kind, etc... "Is" is a form of the root infinitive, to be.  Nowhere in this famous treatise on Love does it mention it being contingent upon feeling a certain way.  Love is ultimately about selflessness, sacrifice, and commitment, and it is unconditional.  We also know that God is Love and that those who do not love do not know God.  "Beloved, let us love one another..." (1 John 4: 7,8)

So when we forgive those whom we love (which includes our enemies, for which we have no fuzzy feelings), we may still feel the occasional sting of their wrongdoing (at least, they were wrong from our perspective).  Continuous resentment, on the other hand, usually tells us that we have not yet forgiven.  But perhaps forgiveness is a process and is not accomplished all at once, in a single moment in time.  It helps to realize that we hurt ourselves the most when we won't forgive, and we do feel so much better when we can put our sorrow in the past.  First love, then forgive.  Only then are we free to come to The Lamb's Supper and be healed by the body and blood of our Lord.