CONGREGATION OF MARY QUEEN - AMERICAN REGION
Dòng Trinh Vương - Chi Dòng Hoa Kỳ
Do Nuns Fall in Love?
Short Answer: YES
Long Answer: As a human we each have a body, heart, mind, and soul. We are human beings with the need to feel love and the desire to be loved. Everybody is attracted and drawn to different kinds of things, places, and people. Nuns are still human. We feel love, want to be loved, and are capable of loving. Yes, besides falling in love with God, nuns do fall in love with men.
Falling in love with a man is not a bad thing. It is a wonderful thing! It makes one step back and ask oneself: What is my true treasure? Who do I want my heart to belong to? Is God enough for me? For me, I choose to STAY IN LOVE and to GROW IN LOVE. I choose to stay in love and grow in love with Jesus, the one who loves me first, called me into this life, and continually walks beside me. He is both my God and my man.
The secret to staying in love (with anyone, especially Jesus)? Stay in Relationship.
The secret to staying in love is to renew your love each morning and every day.
Tình yêu mang lại hạnh phúc.
Tình yêu đòi hỏi sự hy sinh và lòng trung thành.
Tình yêu đòi hỏi sự tin tưởng nơi nhau.
Tinh yêu mang lại sự sống, sự bình an, niềm vui, và sự hy vọng.
Hạnh phúc cho người Tu sĩ biết chọn Thiên Chúa là người Yêu, và Đức Kito là người Tình của mình.
I tell Jesus everyday: You are my first, my last and my only ONE that I love. Thank you for loving me and be faithful to me. Help me to be faithful to you, to love you until death and be a Witness of Love for You.
Robert Sternberg’s (1986, 1988) the triangular theory of love has three components: Passion, intimacy and commitment. Passion is feeling physically aroused and attracted to someone. Intimacy is feeling close and connected to someone; it develops through sharing and communicating. Commitment is making a pledge to nourish the feelings of love and to actively maintain the relationship.
1.) If nuns do "fall in love," what do they do?
Yes, as a human and as a woman it is natural for a religious to fall in love with someone, or someone to fall in love with her. She must sort out her feelings and make a decision for herself. How? First, acknowledging “Am I in love? ” Second, “What do I do about it?” Third, "Is God calling me to marriage life?" or "Is God sending me this person or this occasion to teach me how to love and how to grow in my commitment to Christ?"
2.) What does "falling in love" mean? Is it real? Or is it just an infatuation?
"Falling in love" means you are attracted to someone who is nice to you, kind to you, or supports you in some way. You may want a special relationship with that person, desiring that person to be your lover, or perhaps you just want him to be your companion/friend.
3.) Is there love at first sight?
Love at first sight occurs when you are overwhelmed by passion or good feeling toward that person. Sternberg calls this infatuated love, which can arise in an instant, involved a great deal of physiological arousal and lasts varying lengths of time. Infatuated love is destined to fade away if there is no intimacy or commitment
4.) What does commitment mean?
Again as Sternberg defines, “Commitment is making a pledge to nourish the feelings of love and to actively maintain the relationship.”
God gives us free will. We can fall in love, run away from love or choose to transform this love by inviting this person to grow in spiritual friendship with you for God, for Christ and for the Church.
I believe in “The greater the love for God, the greater the Commitment to Him, then the greater friendship." Many wonderful saints have modeled beautiful male/female spiritual friendships in the history of the Church. However, it takes a great deal of spiritual maturity, love and commitment to God, for example, St. Francis of Assisi and St. Clare; St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross; St. Frances de Sales and St. Jane de Chantal.
5.) What does being in love with Jesus mean?
For me, being in love with Jesus means Jesus is everything to me and everything I am or I do is for JESUS.
As stated above the triangular theory of love has three components: Passion, intimacy and commitment.
1. Passion: I am attracted to Jesus, His person and His teaching and I am attracted to Consecrated Life to live for God and for His people. As a Consecrated person I follow a poor, chaste and obedient Christ.
2. Intimacy: Through prayer and the sacraments, I feel close to Jesus and want to be united with Christ. I want to be one heart, one mind, one thought with Him in doing God’s will and to be there for others.
I love daily Mass so that I can be united with Christ Jesus, who gave up His Body for me. I offer up my own life and everything I have for Jesus in a spousal relationship with Him, just as a married couple can say to one another: “ I love you, my body, my heart, my soul belong to you”. In the same way, I must love Jesus with all my heart, all my soul, all my strength”. The goal to become holy is to become đồng hình, đồng dạng với Đức Kitô.
3. Commitment – “ Let Love and Faithfulness never leave you” (Proverb 3:30). My duty and my mission is to love Jesus and to love others as He loves. As St. Paul said: “It is no longer I live, but it is Christ lives in me. The life I live now is for Christ, who loves me and gave himself up for me.” When I receive the Holy Eucharist, I receive not only His body, but His life and His Mission. As consecrated men and women, we commit our life to God by our worship and our commitment to the Church through our serving of the poor and the Christ in one another.
I am very thankful to God for calling me to religious life. No matter what vocation God is calling you, I believe God only wants you to be happy. Therefore, let us thank God for the gift of LIFE and LOVE. God is Love and He is always faithful.
