Faith Venture

February 14. A day set aside in many countries for couples to express their love—usually taken to mean romantic love.

It began, as many of our holidays, as an early Christian feast day for a Saint Valentine (it seems there was more than one of those in ancient times). 

A chocolatier in 1868 brilliantly conceived packaging chocolates in a red, heart-shaped box.

Love takes many forms. Most of us really don’t need a 2-lb. box of chocolate candy while we deal with our health.

But it might be a good day to acknowledge someone special.

When love meets pain, it becomes compassion.

When love meets happiness, it becomes joy.

Joy is an expression of the awakened heart, a quality of enlightenment. When we live in the present, joy often arises for no reason.

When I came across these thoughts, I was compelled by the spirit to pause and consider. I love that thought of “when love meets…” What a powerful picture.

And I thought about how joy is a fruit of God’s Spirit according to the Apostle Paul.

Then I remembered this little folk song from the time when I sold my electric guitar and bought a nylon-stringed acoustic one and sang folk songs. Many from Catholics in the mid-to-late 60s. Like this one written by Sister Miriam Therese Winter, Joy Is Like The Rain.

I saw raindrops on the river, Joy is like the rain.

Bit by bit the river grows, till all at once it overflows.

Joy is like the rain.

Perhaps today I can rest in joy.