Love is a choice…but it is also a feeling state.

Love is a choice…but it is also a feeling state. Humans need to understand and embody both! The concept of human love is both abstract and concrete and can be divided into four categories: storge (affection), philia (friendship), eros (romance), and agape (sacrifice). The Greeks had four words to describe the dimensions and types of human love. In contrast, modern society has but one word to communicate a broad spectrum of emotions, thoughts, behaviors, and relationships that are the visible signs of love. The psychological sciences and philosophy can help to delineate the concept of love to align with theology. Addressed here is the unity of agape and eros to help further define human love in its completeness. These “types” of love. will be further explored and related to the known concepts of love in the biological and psychological sciences.

When the Church teaches the Biblical truth that love is a choice, the teaching is incomplete without referencing the “type” of love addressed. Eros, the most questioned of the types of love, is the most heavily contested within church teachings, particularly in light of the cultural teachings of the “free love” (meaning love with no consequence and absent of mindful choice) that is seemingly endowed as a human right. Eros is a romantic love that comes to its fullest expression in a marital relationship between a man and a woman. This type of love is a mystery because it comes on as a strong feeling and attraction beyond cognitive reasoning. Since humans have a body and bodily sensations…