"The love for equals is a human thing-of friend for friend, brother for brother. It is to love what is loving and lovely. The world smiles. The love for the less fortunate is a beautiful thing-the love for those who suffer, for those who are poor, the sick, the failures, the unlovely. This is compassion, and it touches the heart of the world. The love for the more fortunate is a rare thing-to love those who succeed where we fail, to rejoice without envy with those who rejoice, the love of the poor for the rich, of the black man for the white man. The world is always bewildered by its saints. And then there is the love for the enemy-love for the one who does not love you but mocks, threatens, and inflicts pain. The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world."
-Frederick Buechner- The Magnificent Defeat
2 comments:
don't think i realized until recently how hard that last love is.
random, but i came across a Frederick Buechner quote today I liked. recognized the name in the quote you posted, so i thought i'd share the freddy love...
"You can kiss your family and friends good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time, you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not jut live in a world, but a world lives in you."
–Frederick Buechner, Telling The Truth
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