Love is a choice-not simply, or necessarily, a rational choice, but rather a willingness to be present to others without pretense or guile.~Carter Heyward

Feeding the hungry is love.

Helping a friend in need is love.

Creating a safe space is love.

Reading to the sick is love.

Sharing a meal with family is love.

Worshiping in community is love

Praising others is love.

Not hiding yourself is love.

It is relatively easy to love everyone in the abstract, but this obligation is more than an abstraction. It is a concrete imperative that must be taken seriously. We must love by doing.  Everyday as best we can.

 In the Hebrew tradition to love everyone as one loves oneself literally means that before we dress and eat in the morning, we must dress and feed the entire world, and all this after having not gone to sleep the previous night without assuring that everyone has a place to sleep.

No one can do this alone.

No one person, no single organization and no singular governmental agency. We need  each other to love. We need to share our time, energy and resources so that  we all are fed, dressed and sheltered. It is not easy, but it is doable.

Institutions have inherit limits…. people do not.  Institutions can not love…people can.

Our institutions can only offer service – not care, not  love. We cannot purchase care. Care is the freely given commitment from the heart of one to another. As neighbors, we care for each other. We care for our children. We care for our elders. And it is this care that is the basic power of  community.

Love cannot be provided, managed or purchased from systems.

You want to do the MOST good? Love and care for one anther and mean it.

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