First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis

The Problem with Love

I have only once in my life heard an explanation of the Christian doctrine of the trinity that made any sort of sense to me. It was based on the passage in one of the new testament epistles which states that god is love, and it challenged the all too common human assumption of divine anthropomorphism; that god must necessarily be a concrete character, or personality, like one of us. We tend, said this preacher, to reify the statement that God is love by assuming that the grammar is slightly off, and that what is really meant is that god is a personality with the quality of being loving; that god the entity has affectionate feelings toward the world, and toward humanity in particular. That god is loving makes sense to us; we like that idea. But if we take the statement more seriously in its original form, god is not a noun at all. If god is love, then god is not actually either the father, or the son, or the holy spirit; that this is how we have come to think of them is our own misplaced concreteness. What if, instead, the members of the trinity are only the participants in a relationship of love, and it is the love among them that is, in fact, divine? The creative energy that calls the universe into being, and summons us into mutuality and justice, is not a being, but a force; that which connects the creator, redeemer and sustainer of the world to one another, flowing between each of them and holding them together in a dynamic mutuality that sheds its joyful intensity across the stars. There cannot be love without participants; you have to have those three beings as the poles amongst which love moves, but it is not the beings themselves who are what is most essentially holy. It is not the father who is love, nor the son, nor the holy spirit; rather, love is that which unites them – as, at our best, it unites us – and their unity with each other is the sacred source, which is why we think of them as three in one. Now, my birthright Unitarianism is not in jeopardy, but I like that image. For surely, surely whatever is going on here in this universe is something more than the adventures of a really really big, really really strong, really really smart cartoon character of a human being trying to be in charge of everything.

So the question before us this morning, on this Valentine’s Day weekend, is whether love is, in fact, an adequate replacement for a vanished, or banished, god. Both Vonnegut and Millay suggest, in their own ways, that it is not. "Love is not all," says Millay; Vonnegut claims that "love is too strong a word," and I tend to think that they are both correct. For it seems to me that love – many-splendored thing though it is – is just as contingent and finite and fallible as any other human characteristic, and requires that we understand how it is rooted in our physiology, and nurtured by intentional practice, much like any spiritual resource for a meaningful and fully human life.

Whether or not human nature is designed to seek and find something like god – which is a question now being hotly debated in certain neurological research circles – we are quite clearly designed to seek and discover love. We are born with an urgent and absolute need for outside assistance in regulating the complex physiological processes by which our bodies adjust to the environment and satisfy our various needs. As a series of unintentional experiments with human orphans demonstrated conclusively in the early 20^th century, most infants literally cannot survive without affectionate interactions, even if all their nutritional and physical requirements are met, and those few who do manage to live do not thrive, and grow into socially stunted, emotionally dysfunctional adults. Physiologist Thomas Lewis and his colleagues in their ground-breaking treatise on A General Theory of Love demonstrate that like those of many other species, human biological systems are open-ended feedback loops; we need other people, in the most physical possible ways, to help us breathe, respond, grow, sleep, think, heal, reproduce, and most of the other functions of an effective life. From contact with their mothers, or if necessary other adults, babies learn to breathe dependably, to regulate their body temperature, to become tense and to relax, as well as more obviously acquired skills such as communication. The connection with the person who enables all this to happen is experienced as emotionally gratifying, and we who observe it call it love.

This process is not mysterious in infants; we are all massively programmed by our evolutionary heritage to expect it, and it happens by an instinct so strong that new born ducklings will imprint upon a John Deere tractor and follow it with great determination, if in the absence of their mother, it is the first moving object they see. The physiologists call this phenomenon limbic regulation, and it’s not just for babies. In human beings it is a life-long process by which our intensely social species creates the conditions of mutual flourishing for one another. As we grow beyond the sphere of the parent bond, we learn to regulate with our peers, as siblings and friends, with our teachers or other authority figures, with our potential and actual sexual partners, with co-workers, with our own children and grandchildren, or those of others, and even, as every animal lover has always known, with other species who share our homes and lives. Mark and I have a standing joke that Bridget, our cat, has the power to put a sleep spell on either one of us, by climbing into her chosen victim’s lap, curling up with deep, throaty purrs, and going to sleep herself. No doubt there’s a great deal of power of suggestion there, together with the effect of enforced stillness on people who may be tired to begin with, but I’m convinced that her warmth and breathing closes a limbic loop in us, which contributes to both her and our well-being. Or you might just say, we love that cat, and it would seem that she is fond of us as well.

All of these intimate relationships fall into the category of what we might call personal limbic regulation; through close interactions, through touch, and eating and sleeping together, through pheromones and environmental cues, we regulate one another’s physical and emotional well-being, create excitement and pleasure, moderate stress, and literally inform each other’s bodies and minds in order to function more effectively in the world. The seemingly mysterious thing about all these connections is the way in which they occur largely apart from our intentions; we imprint upon parental figures before we have any conscious intentions; we ‘fall in love’ with partners who may or may not be suitable for us; we cherish our children more or less regardless of their virtues compared to other kids. I could not begin to explain to you why I had a crush on my junior high civics teacher rather than the also perfectly nice people who taught me English, or science. That falling in love sensation is mediated by deep physiological impulses, in which reason does not participate. Yet that impulse, if it is successful, induces us to enter into relational responsibilities which reason will have everything to do with our fulfilling, and it is that dimension of love which makes it a human and moral proposition as well as an instinctual one. We cannot will ourselves to feel that initial limbic response where it does not spontaneously occur, although as many an arranged marriage or adoption has demonstrated, physical proximity, environmental cues, and shared interests over time will often produce a mutual limbic regulation that is just as real as what comes of original hormonal attraction. Which is part of why love is so difficult to define, since our understanding of it includes both of these elements. The important point is that for us as human beings, limbic impulses are not enough in themselves to constitute authentic love. Beyond the internal chemical cocktails that lure us into becoming lovers, parents, friends, or the owner of a ferret, lies the long-term commitment that must be sustained by intention, responsibility, and moral will. Our need for limbic mutuality is enduring; we need our parents not only when we are dimpled and cooing, but also when we are teething, and having the measles, and learning to drive. We need to be touched and held by partners and friends not only when we are charming, amusing, and smelling good, but also when we are depressed, or infected, or have just overdrawn the checking account. The great gift of pets is that they mostly do not care about your physical or social failings; the dog is ecstatic to see you even when you are sweaty or late for dinner or flunking algebra – yet in return for this dependable approval there is still the responsibility of food and water and walks and trips to the vet. Love, in other words, entails both the wordless sustenance of limbic mutuality, and the practice of disciplined, intentional care.

And yet, I want to suggest, even at their best, these personal exchanges of limbic regulation combined with the practice of care do not suffice to make us fully human. Our nature also requires what I want to call impersonal limbic regulation; that which comes only in the context of a larger community, precisely where who we are as an individual is less significant than our participation in something collective beyond ourselves. Enlightenment liberalism has sometimes taught its adherents to look with suspicion upon this impulse; to consider it a degraded succumbing to the tyranny of the popular, a surrender of one’s integrity, and there is some good reason for this caution. Impersonal limbic regulation is easily observed in the power of mob psychology; not only are people freed from individual accountability and inhibition by being one anonymous member of a crowd, but they also become caught up in one another’s elemental feelings, reflecting fear, excitement, and aggression back and forth until it is magnified beyond what any one person can account for. One dramatic example of this process can be seen in the recordings of Hitler’s rallies in Nazi Germany; the settings, the rhetoric, the music, the mass energy all serve to bring the participants into a state of coordinated arousal that is tremendously powerful, and as we know had tragic results. The same process can be observed on a smaller scale in the bonding that occurs between or among people who undergo a frightening experience together, for there is no more powerful limbic energy than fear. Suspenseful movies can actually be better for dates than sentimental ones, because the shared anxiety brings people into limbic openness more readily, and subtly, than the overtly romantic does. People who are afraid together feel connected to one another; this is one of our species’ oldest survival mechanisms, and despite all the veneer of our modern civilization, it remains easily triggered, and a potent path to impersonal limbic regulation. I suspect that Jonathan Edwards and other popular preachers evoked this effect in congregations with their fire and brimstone accounts of the terrors of hell; the feeling of shared fear would have created a limbic bond among the hearers who believed in such visions.

Another way to create impersonal limbic connections is through a sense of shared superiority; this is part of why racism has been such an intractable challenge for our nation, and why homophobia continues its poisonous influence. Unless a better alternative is available, most people are extremely reluctant to give up the limbic regulation of feeling in synch with those who share a superior status over a despised other. But as with shared fear, this is a cheap and manipulative way to create the bonds of community, which is why you will never hear me encourage anybody to think that humanists are collectively smarter or better than anybody else. We don’t need that kind of arousal; it cheapens both what humanism stands for, and the authentic sense of community that we are working to build here. I am deeply suspicious of the motives of those who seek to make me feel like part of a favored group, whether as an American, or a woman, or a consumer, or in any other role that I have. I know that I am not immune to the appeal of that type of limbic connection, but I also know that it isn’t the kind of love by which I would hope and choose to shape my life.

Fortunately, there are a number of other, more legitimate ways to induce the impersonal limbic regulation which is what we often mean when we speak of the experience of felt community. Such connections are just as fundamental to the realization of our full humanity as the personal intimacy of our more immediate relationships, and like them, require intentional cultivation in order to be sustained. I would argue that this is in fact an essential function of religious community, and that when it is done with integrity, it contributes not only to the well-being of the participants, but also to the collective health of the culture as a whole. By the same token, when religious institutions manipulate through exciting their members’ fear and superiority, they help to create opportunities for collective violence, injustice, and oppression. It is possible for people to become limbicly connected by sharing the intellectual excitement of ideas, common convictions, and discoveries. Scientists working together on an absorbing research effort are likely to develop feelings for one another – sometimes competitive and irritable, but far more often feelings of mutual gratitude, esteem, and appreciation. Students who are able to help each other through a challenging course may well be friends by the end of it, and I know as a teacher that there is a significant bond with the pupil who I watch open up to a novel concept or a new understanding. There is something about discovering a shared taste for a particular author, or obscure field of study, that makes people feel very satisfied with one another, and begins to forge the bonds of limbic connection. The same is true of working in cooperation toward some significant accomplishment; people who have exerted energy together, whether physical or mental, are likely to have positive regard for each other, and to close ranks against those who in their view were not part of that effort. Whether it is putting on a play, or winning a soccer game, or getting a candidate elected, demanding work for meaningful results draws people into a sense of community. So does shared risk and struggle, even when the outcome is not what we were seeking, or remains uncertain of success. Thus the suffragettes, and the civil rights workers of the fifties and sixties, created intense communities, but this is not the exclusive province of progressive causes. Part of what makes the right to life movement so persistent is that its members are nourished by the same sense of shared commitment and mutual engagement as say, the members of the global peace movement. Community is an equal-opportunity limbic response; it does not depend upon the righteousness, or even the rationality, of the cause in question. If the effort entails a certain amount of shared risk and danger, it becomes even more powerful, which is why people in groups can face situations which would have overwhelmed them as individuals. The brief euphoria that comes at the end of such an encounter is a powerful limbic connection for those who share it. Another set of strong limbic connectors are memory, grief, and nostalgia. People who found little in common when they were actually high school students together may bond very quickly at their 25^th class reunion, through the impact of shared memories, and wistfulness for time gone by. Estranged spouses have been known to be brought back together by their shared sorrow over the death or illness of a child, although such an event can also destroy a marriage when the partners do not find a shared physiological rhythm to their grieving. More mechanical methods of limbic synchronization also work; singing is a powerful one, because it creates a common pattern of breathing as well as sound; eating together is obviously another. Movement, such as dance, as well as shared postures like kneeling or certain meditation poses, can be effective too. Collective drinking or drug use also works, though it may be difficult to stop participants from becoming so impaired that the effect degenerates into merely an experience of shared suffering.

All of these techniques have been used from time to time in various traditions and cultures to help create the experience of religious community. It is my supposition that when people of traditional faith talk about a collective experience of god’s presence or power, what they are describing is this impersonal kind of limbic mutuality, the sensation of being an integrated part of a larger organic whole, connected by a reality that feels both within and beyond our own intention, and into which our individuality is at least momentarily subsumed. As much as we need the physical and emotional feedback loops of our most intimate personal relationships, we also need the impersonal intimacy of community; the softening of the hard edges of our separate identity, enabling us to be included in a whole that transcends the finitude of selfhood.

The problem with love is that our systems are designed to plug into other people’s systems; it’s what we exist for, and we cannot be human without other people to complete the network. Yet the biology of those connections is only the beginning for us; when we undertake the responsibilities of either personal or communal covenants, we bring human intention and moral compass into the equation. It’s powerful stuff, this limbic hunger, this impulse to love, yet alone it is not enough to make us whole. That is precisely why we need communities that witness not only to our connections, but also to our aspirations, and that hold us accountable to the wisdom of our heritage as well. We can learn to find our limbic satisfactions in an artificially fostered confidence of our own shared superiority, and confrontations with cultivated enemies, but that way lies our mutual destruction in the end. Such feelings do not serve our humanity; as Vonnegut suggests, we would be better off to cultivate respect for one another. Or we can choose to practice the higher arts of community building; substantive work, intellectual excitement, risk and struggle, memory and song. The essence of our humanity is that we have the power to choose how we will nourish our most instinctual hungers, how we will manifest the love within which we necessarily live and move and have our being. Love is not all, but as Millay confesses, without it we can only make friends with death, and although we cannot be commanded to love, neither can we thrive until we have completed the personal and impersonal connections that our mind/body systems are designed to make. I don’t believe that love is a satisfactory replacement for the old notion of god, but I do think that it is part of what human beings have always had in mind when they tried to talk about what god meant to them.

Truly, we need one another, individually and collectively, all our lives long. Only as we build the connections of community does our essential humanity unfold. As we celebrate the inherent worth and dignity, the integrity and potential of each unique personality, may we remember this as well, that we are in need of others, and others are in need of us, and work responsibly to create the communities of connection that will enable us to become all that we have the capacity to be together.