James Lyness Loving

The following “Grad at Grad Reflection” talk was delivered by Mr. James Lyness at morning assembly on February 26, 2013. “A Loyola student is becoming more loving” Good morning! A Loyola student is becoming more loving.

Love is a Many Splendored Thing; Love Can Make You Happy; Love, Love Will Keep Us Together; Love is in the Air; Our Love is Here to Stay; Love Makes the World Go ‘Round Numerous songs revolve around the theme of that powerful emotion, love. A Loyola student is becoming more loving, yet the Tina Turner song dares to ask, “What’s love got to do, got to do with it???”

“What’s love got to do with it?” I’d say that love has got just about everything to do with it! As St. Paul told us in his letter to the Corinthians: We can speak in all of the languages of human beings or even of the angels, but if we don’t have love, our speech is nothing more than a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. We can give away everything we have to the poor and even go as far as to sacrifice ourselves for the sake of others, but if we don’t have love, we gain nothing.

That’s a pretty strong message. Jesus gave us an equally strong message when he told his apostles at the last supper that he was giving them a new commandment.

Jesus said, “Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. If you have love for one another, then everyone will know that you are my disciples.”

It seems that if we want to follow the teachings of Christ, this “love thing” is a pretty important aspect of it. According to the Grad-at-Grad document, a person who is loving is recognizing that he or she is loved by God and others.

I suspect that for all of us, the recognition that we are loved came from our parents. I remember one time when I was 8 or 9, I ended up in a fight in my back yard

with another kid in the neighborhood who was older – probably 10 – who had insulted my sister in some way that I can’t even remember now. I was no match for him, and pretty rapidly, he had me pinned to the ground and was punching away. After it was over, I headed into my house, crying, and my mother was at the back door. I think she had seen the end of the fight, and she just reached down and hugged me for a long time, not saying a word. It let me know that, no matter what had happened, she didn’t care and didn’t need to know. She was there for me and it was an example to me of unconditional love.

When we are younger, our relationships are all about “taking,” not “giving.”

When we are babies, we rely on those around us to provide us with just about everything we need for survival. As we grow older, that dependence lessens. You are at the stage in your lives when being “loving” in a relationship can – and should – begin to be far less self-centered and should begin to mean giving, not taking. I want to tell you about a recent example in my life that characterized what it means to be loving.

Up until this past December, I had a dear friend in my life named Saul. I met Saul in 1980, and so, had known him for over 30 years. Next week, Saul would have turned 97 years old. He lived a long, interesting, and incredible life, and I used to love to listen to his stories – even though, by the age of 97, he had long forgotten which ones he had already told me, and I heard most of them again and again! One Sunday evening in December, I went to Saul’s apartment, bringing along food for dinner. We usually had a meal together once or twice a week, and in recent winters, I would often cook those meals at his apartment on a Sunday evening. Saul had given me a key

because he was becoming frailer and it was easier for him if I could just let myself in, so that he didn’t have to come to the door. That Sunday evening, when I entered, I found Saul lying on his back on the floor of his hallway between his living room and his kitchen, semi-conscious, disoriented, and with dried blood on his clothing. It was clear from the food that sat uneaten on his stove that Saul had probably been there for at least twenty-four hours. It was the beginning of the last week of Saul’s life, and I spent a great deal of my time with him; I know I took the opportunity to become more loving during that week, but I am not relating this story in order to talk about the ways I helped Saul, but to talk about two ways in which I witnessed the love of others – the selfless love that is an example of the way Jesus wants us to love.

The phone call I made after finding Saul was to my friend, Cynthia, who is a nurse. I wanted Cynthia’s advice on what to do. She could easily have given me some direction over the phone, or simply told me to call 9-1-1 immediately; but a person who is loving is willing to make sacrifices for others. Cynthia was out the door in about three minutes, and arrived at Saul’s apartment within about 20 minutes. She helped me to assess Saul’s situation and get him into bed and get the medical attention and help that he needed at home. (As Saul’s health care proxy, I knew how important it was to him to be able to stay at home.) During the following week, Cynthia often left her very demanding and high-powered job early to come to Saul’s apartment; she would constantly text me to ask how Saul, and I, were both doing. She was not a close friend of Saul’s (she probably hadn’t seen him in about 10 years), but she was doing what she did because of her love for me. The display of that love was incredibly

important and touching to me, and helped me to reconnect again with how loved I am by others – a love which I can see as a reflection of the love God has for me. When we can be attentive to seeing that love and identifying it, I think it becomes easier for us to give that love back to others and to grow into a more loving person.

I also want to tell you about Sandra, one of the home aids that I hired for Saul, as he was now unable to care for himself. Sandra was being paid for her work, but I could tell from my conversations with her that she did what she did because of her deep faith in God and her selfless love of others that grew out of that faith. She had the opportunity to be with Saul at the beginning of the week, when he could still interact somewhat with others. She would hold his hand and talk to him, and ask him questions that would only require fairly simple responses. One time, when I was there with Sandra, she was on one side of the bed holding Saul’s hand, and I was on the other. She had asked him earlier in the day if she could give him a shave – he hadn’t had one in over a week at that point – and he agreed. She looked down at his now clean-shaven face and said to him, “What a handsome man you are, Saul!” Saul looked at her, and then directed his gaze at me with a questioning look. I said to him, “She says you’re very handsome!” Saul looked back over at Sandra and retorted, “You must need your eyes examined,” but he smiled, and you could just tell how good that simple loving gesture from her made him feel. More than any of the other aids, Sandra spent time in Saul’s room with him (as opposed to out in the living room watching TV when they didn’t feel Saul needed attention). Sandra would talk to him, give him sips of something to drink, readjust his position on the pillows, and rub his back to help make

him feel more comfortable. After a few days off, she returned for a shift on what turned out to be Saul’s last day, and she saw what a dramatic decline there had been in Saul’s condition. As Sandra left after that shift, I told her that I would see her in the morning. She told me that she intended to pray that the angels would come and wrap their arms around Saul and take him peacefully that night. And that is exactly what happened. Even though I texted her early the next morning that Saul had passed away, she insisted on coming over to be with me as final arrangements were made.

Although she had only known Saul for a week, she was a shining example of a person who had the ability to show what it meant to be loving. She knew very little about Saul, about what he thought or believed, and yet, she saw him as one of God’s children, and therefore, worthy of her love, without any demands for a return of that love.

As all of us continue to grow into people who are more loving, I hope that the care we show for others can be like that selfless and unconditional love that our parents show for us, that Cynthia showed for me, and that Sandra showed for Saul. I hope you will take the time to reflect on the opportunities you’ve had here at Loyola and elsewhere in your lives to make sacrifices for others, to be there for others, and to be a reflection of God’s love for others in your life. And as you make choices about the way you act in the future, I hope that if someone asks you the question “What’s love got to do with it?” your answer will be: “Everything.” That’s the way God would want it.