The amounts of times I have heard this phrase…
I love you…..but…..
“I mean we love Ally, but we cannot celebrate with you at her wedding because we must stand before God and justify our actions and we cannot do that when we so strongly believe that marriage is between a man and a woman”.
Hearing these words a few months before my wedding. My aunt and uncle had pulled my parents aside at church and told them that they were so deeply conflicted because they just cannot support what I am doing, but they love me!
I don’t think I have the same definition of love as them.
Completely ignoring my engagement, refusing to even address my fiance during the holidays, pulling my parents aside to tell them they are not coming to the wedding, sending a letter two months before the wedding sharing why i shouldn’t be getting married.
love.
this is why the “I love you…but” doesn’t work for me. If you say “but” after “I love you”, I won’t hear the“I love you” I will only hear the but.
You are not loving me. You are not saving me from my “sin”. You are not doing your duty to God. You are hurting me. a human. a real life human- not an “issue”, a “political topic”.
You are hurting me.
You are creating distance between us and our families. You are making it harder for people to want to be around you and want to be around a church.
My cal has the deepest understanding for people like this. She so badly wants us to be able to coexist with people who do not believe the same thing as us. Part of me thinks there is a way that we can do that.
I just don’t think what they did is it.
thankfully their “love” cannot outweigh the love and grace and kindness of Jesus.
and
thankfully I have enough self respect and love for my cal that they weren’t on the guest list anyway.
HomeToMyLove 