But love can do it when
there is enough of it.
Nor is that the hardest thing love has to do. There come times when,
because nobody is always good, and most of us are often bad, love has
to face the plain fact of sin in the loved object. At such times to
approve is impossible, and would be a real disloyalty. To break out
into mere reproaches is futile and irritating. To do nothing is to let
a seed of separation sink into the common life. Yet the situation can
be met. It can be met by real love, because love can forgive.
Forgiveness does not mean condoning wrong. It does not mean blindness,
which is never a helpful thing. It means loving the person who has
stumbled in spite of the fact, and even perhaps just because of it. It
is at such times that one who has failed most needs love, and when
therefore love gets a supreme chance. But if a husband or a wife has
not enough love to take that chance, then marriage may fail.
And here I am not talking about exceptional cases. Whoever you are, if
you marry you are going to marry a sinner--a man or a woman who will
some day fall below his best self or her best self.
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