Is Love a Choice or an Emotion?

To will the Good of another. For some, this is the definition of love. The English language does a terrible job capturing what love means. We use love to express sentiments such as food preference and binding commitments. I prefer to think of it as “to WILL the good of the other,” Because it places love as an act of the will not a preference.

A good debate is between if Love is an emotion or a choice. If you believe that Love is an emotion. Then love is a feeling that you can’t control. It is a passion that “happens to” us. Your environment and genetic disposition therefore conditions you to love certain things. It is easy to believe in fate or a “one true love” when the object of your love is determined by external factors. What a miserable existence if we were to never feel love due to being in the wrong environment. What a miserable existence if we constantly feel love towards that which is harmful to us. Heaven forbid that love is solely an emotion.

I obviously believe love is a choice more than an emotion, but such a dichotomy is false. Love is an emotion as well. There is an experience of love where some things and some people are just easier to care for and invest in. I like how Saint John Paul II describes love as a virtue. Because a virtue is a habit that is excellent while it’s opposite is vice a bad habit. If love is a virtue, then it is something that we can be bad at and rarely feel, but it is also something that we can be good at and feel often.

Praise the Lord that Love is a habit. Habits can be changed and reinforced. Imagine the hope that we feel when we can learn to love something. Imagine the despair we feel when hatred and misery will always be our companion. Skeptics would say this growth of the habit of love is a type of brainwashing or Stockholm syndrome. Both objections obstinately cling to the idea that our choices are dictated by our reality. Unfortunately, God gave us free will which means our environments do not have a final say in our choices. God gave us free will which means our habits do not have a final say in our choices. God gave us free will which mean our next choice is the choice that matters.

The Average Catholic have people that they love and they have people that they do not love. It is normal to lack the time, talent, and energy to show all people all the love that is possible and prudent for a giving situation. There are some people that we just can’t seem to get along with. Yet, Our Lord Jesus the Christ, mandates us to love our enemies. Such a command would be impossible to fulfill if we are products of our environments. Thank the Lord it is our choice to love who we love.

My fellow average Catholics, I ask you to make an effort to show love towards people that it may not be intuitive to love. Please, don’t not hardened your hearts to your fellow pilgrims to heaven. If there is a person in your life that it is difficult to love, then that same person could be sign from God on how to grow in love. We can grow in love. We can love more and more. We can love bigger and broader and more enthusiastically. Way imprison ourselves into thinking love is just an emotion and we can’t help who we love? No, Love is a choice and a choice that can change our lives. Go forth and choose love!