Appendix 10. The Size of Love

Everyone longs to be loved. We think that as much as we love someone, we should naturally be loved in return. Look at the troubles that arise over love, and most of them come down to this: one side thinks it has given love, while the other feels it has received none and thirsts and complains. Here is a simple example. When snow falls from the sky, children run outside and, whether they see big fluffy flakes or sleet, all of them shout that it is snowing. Yet being caught in big flakes feels very different from being caught in sleet. Big flakes cover everything in white—the dirty road, the heaps of garbage, the colors of the cars. Sleet, though, dirties even the clean road and the car that has just been washed. Love is the same. If you have made up your mind to give love, you must give it heaped up like big snowflakes, so that the other person has love enough and to spare. But a stingy person gives love like sleet and then asks why the other is still thirsty and complaining after being given love. It must be because they believe they have given.

Big flakes and sleet are both snow, it is true, but we must know that the two are not the same. We must pour love out on someone who longs for it until they are buried in it, as in deep snow, and feel its warmth. That snow will melt and flow like a stream to refresh them. At the sound of the running stream, those nearby will feel the coolness too, and their laughter will gather into happiness. Love like sleet will only weigh on the one who receives it. For though the other person is plainly giving love, the one on the receiving end always feels empty, thirsty, and unhappy. When, like big snowflakes, you cover even the other person’s faults and complaints and give them peace, they will say on their own that they are happy, without your ever having to ask.

That love is the love of God. Our Father pours out his love wholly on his own initiative, until his children say of themselves that they are happy and thankful. If you who belong to God do just as he does, those who receive your love will be able to see God through it.