Tuesday 4 November 2003

Pic of the day: I'm here to save you with my love! (Screenshot from the anime Azumanga Daioh. The character here is Sakaki-san, and it's from a dream sequence. And not her own, either.)

Human love

Since I am writing a romance novel, it goes without saying that the single most powerful motivation in the book is love. Unless the characters foil my best laid plans, the main challenge is the male protagonist's choice between either closing himself in with his perceived evil, or opening himself up to love. The desired outcome is of course that love is stronger than evil, and everyone is happy.

I feel guilty for lying like that.

In real life, I believe human love is shallow and dirty like a puddle in the road. Only divine love is the fresh, clear spring from which the spirit may safely drink. Good human love is only possible between those who are already good; it does not have the power to transform the soul. That's just a cliché from fiction, and those who believe it risk horrible suffering and even death, because most "evil" people in real life are sociopaths and will not change until they lie cold and dead (the sooner the better).

***

This is not to say that human love is worthless and worse than nothing. Love is an instinct programmed into us by the Creator, just like it is in other animals. Even a bear will fight to the death for her offspring, and a songbird will risk her life to lead predators away from the nest. As usual, human emotions are even more nuanced, and we have a long life to hone them. We even have a certain degree of personal choice or free will.

But without a spiritual life, we have no platform outside ourselves. And so we see again and again that people fail, because they try to change others. This is beyond human power. You can give others an environment that lets them unfold their good sides, you can encourage them and support them. But if they don't want to be good, there is nothing you can do about it. (This, I believe, is why Israel's God through Moses installed a back door to the commandment not to murder: Parents could sentence their children to death if they had grown up but not shaped up. Sounds like a great idea, although I doubt it was ever much used.)

The short: In real life, I doubt a woman's love can save anything more evil than an underage goth, and not even all of them.

Consequently I write a novel about a young man who wants to be good but who fear his own evil. Whether the female protagonist understands that, I don't know yet. Sometimes people understand things with their heart that they don't understand with their brain. And other times, sadly, it is the other way around.