Published: February 10, 2008 01:17 am            

VASICEK: This Valentine’s Day ask the Tina Turner question

Valentine’s Day is the holiday that celebrates romantic love. But some people do not believe that any kind of love actually exists. Some (far from all) psychologists maintain that love is nothing more than a disguised form of selfishness: We show love to others because of what the emotions associated with love do for us. Although I agree that such is often the case with infatuation, I am persuaded that love can be a genuine entity.

“I love you because you are utilitarian to me” somehow makes for a lackluster Valentine’s card. Romance becomes nothing more than a prelude to procreation. If these psychologists are correct, then love is merely an intoxicating delusion. Therefore, no one really loves their spouses, children or parents – simply because love does not exist. Sounds a lot like Mr. Spock on “Star Trek,” doesn’t it? And just about as far out, in my opinion.

What about the elderly couple in which one spouse works to the point of exhaustion, caring for his/her bedridden mate? When that soldier, firefighter or police officer goes beyond the call of duty and risks his life to save a comrade, is this nothing more than peer pressure? Come on.

Christian thinker Francis Schaeffer coined a phrase in the 1960’s that has made it into my computer’s spell-check program: the “mannishness” of man. By mannishness, Schaeffer meant that human reality stares us in the face. We cannot live as some of these theorists advise because their advice does not match the realities of daily life.

Although I have a selfish streak like everyone else, my love for my wife extends beyond one hand washing the other. Anyone else who genuinely loves another will bear similar testimony. True, not everyone knows what it is to love others, and the self-serving (I call it “weasel”) love that some exhibit is far from the genuine article. But, just as counterfeit money does not negate the reality of properly minted currency, so false love does not negate the existence of real love.

So we must ask ourselves the Tina Turner question, “What’s Love Got to Do With It?” I feel sorry for those who answer “nothing.”

According to one source, “Recent studies in psychology suggest that the pursuit of self-interest may not be the clearest path to the greater good or personal happiness, as so widely assumed. When researchers study what makes us happy, they find that it is not personal wealth, the strength of the stock market, inflation or interest rates that cause the ebb and flow in our personal well-being. What makes us happy, what matters in the end, is the quality of our romantic and family bonds, our connection to our friends, and doing things for others.” (Source: www.atruists.org.)

Even more interesting is the late-breaking UK article suggesting that expressing our love helps lower cholesterol:

“According to new research, writing down affectionate thoughts about close friends and family can reduce your cholesterol levels. Floyd et al. (2007) randomly assigned participants to one of two groups: one experimental and one control. The experimental group wrote with affection about one person in their lives for 20 minutes on three occasions over a five-week period. The control group wrote mundane descriptions of their activities over the week, jobs they had done and places they had lived.

“The results from two separate studies demonstrated that after only 25 days, the experimental group who had written affectionate notes, showed a significant reduction in cholesterol. These reductions were seen independently from the effects of general health factors like age, drinking, smoking and so on. Mean cholesterol levels reduced from 170 mg/dL to 159 mg/dL.” (Source: www.spring.org.uk/2007/03/affectionate-writing-can-reduce.php.)

People who believe in love are not going to become romantic or start caring more about others for health reasons. Love doesn’t work that way. They love because it is part of who they are, and cynics simply cannot relate to that.

Valentine’s Day may be about romance and chocolates, but it serves as a reminder that most Americans believe that love exists. Happy Valentine’s Day!

Ed Vasicek is pastor of Highland Park Church and a weekly contributor to the Kokomo Tribune.

        

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