So I'm reading The Brothers Karamazov, and came across the most delightful passage while riding the blue line. Here's a link to part of it on some other guy's blog. It's a priest talking to a woman about "active love," as he calls it.
'One cannot prove anything here, but it is possible to be convinced.'Check out the rest of it. Thoughts?'How? By What?'
'By the experience of active love. Try to love your neighbors actively and tirelessly. The more you succeed in loving, the more you'll be convinced of the existence of God and the immortality of your soul. And if you reach complete selflessness in the love of your neighbor, then undoubtedly you will believe, and no doubt will even be able to enter your soul. This has been tested. It is certain.' ...
'Active love is a harsh and fearful thing compared with love in dreams. Love in dreams thirsts for immediate action, quickly performed, and with everyone watching. Indeed, it will go so far as the giving of even one's life, provided it does not take long but is soon over, as on statge, and everyone is looking on and praising. Whereas active love is labor and perserverance, and for some people, perhaps, a whole science. But I predict that even in that very moment when you see with horror that despite all your efforts, you not only have not come nearer your goal but seem to have gotten farther from it, at that very moment--I predict this to you--you will suddenly reach your goal aqnd will clearly behold over you the wonder-working power of the Lord, who all the while has been loving you, and all the while has been mysteriously guiding you.'
