KISMET OR GRACE?
August 29, 2007
And I always thought love was a choice. "For the one who believes [in the Truth] and for the one who loves, there is no other truth and there is no other love."
F.
Often the question is raised as to whether falling in love is a matter of fate or coincidence. We wonder whether there is one special person for us, or whether given just the right circumstances we might equally well fall in love with any of a number of suitable candidates, or indeed with anyone at all.
A moment's reflection will suggest that, however titillating this question may be, it is really no question at all, for the appearance of two distinct alternatives is purely sophistical. Even if two people are destined from before their births to fall in love, surely some sort of coincidence is still necessary to bring them together. But on the other hand, if it is true that any two people may fall in love, given a suitable coincidence, then what is to say that this special set of circumstances known as coincidence has not been predetermined? After all, it is not as if circumstances can ever be considered as being external to the people concerned; on the contrary, the people, inseparable from all the baggage of their peculiar personalities, and unique histories, are the circumstances. Fate and coincidence, it turns out, are names for the same thing. The door of coincidence turns upon the hinges of fate.
Either way, the great mystery is that one cannot fall in love at will. It is one of those things that just happens, and whether the mechanism that makes it happen be termed kismet or coincidence, accident or grace, we are nevertheless at its mercy. Even freedom, true freedom, cannot be manufactured in the depths of the human will but can be bestowed only as a gift. The train schedule of love runs on its own sweet time.
What is interesting, however, about this question of the fortuitousness of love, of whether it turns upon fate or coincidence, is that it is seriously asked only by those who are not yet in love, or not deeply in love, or who in fact have no idea what love is. These are the sort of people who like to ponder whether the lover they have found might be only one of any number of possibilities. But the person who is truly in love, by contrast, couldn't care less about other possibilities, just as one who has found the Truth takes no interest in 'other truths." For the one who believes and for the one who loves, there is no other truth and there is no other love.
So real love is always fated. It has been arranged from before time. It is the most meticulously prepared of coincidences. And fate, of course, is simply the secular term for the will of God, and coincidence for His grace.
pages 66,67
The Mystery Of Marriage
Mike Mason
And I always thought love was a choice. "For the one who believes [in the Truth] and for the one who loves, there is no other truth and there is no other love."
F.
Often the question is raised as to whether falling in love is a matter of fate or coincidence. We wonder whether there is one special person for us, or whether given just the right circumstances we might equally well fall in love with any of a number of suitable candidates, or indeed with anyone at all.
A moment's reflection will suggest that, however titillating this question may be, it is really no question at all, for the appearance of two distinct alternatives is purely sophistical. Even if two people are destined from before their births to fall in love, surely some sort of coincidence is still necessary to bring them together. But on the other hand, if it is true that any two people may fall in love, given a suitable coincidence, then what is to say that this special set of circumstances known as coincidence has not been predetermined? After all, it is not as if circumstances can ever be considered as being external to the people concerned; on the contrary, the people, inseparable from all the baggage of their peculiar personalities, and unique histories, are the circumstances. Fate and coincidence, it turns out, are names for the same thing. The door of coincidence turns upon the hinges of fate.
Either way, the great mystery is that one cannot fall in love at will. It is one of those things that just happens, and whether the mechanism that makes it happen be termed kismet or coincidence, accident or grace, we are nevertheless at its mercy. Even freedom, true freedom, cannot be manufactured in the depths of the human will but can be bestowed only as a gift. The train schedule of love runs on its own sweet time.
What is interesting, however, about this question of the fortuitousness of love, of whether it turns upon fate or coincidence, is that it is seriously asked only by those who are not yet in love, or not deeply in love, or who in fact have no idea what love is. These are the sort of people who like to ponder whether the lover they have found might be only one of any number of possibilities. But the person who is truly in love, by contrast, couldn't care less about other possibilities, just as one who has found the Truth takes no interest in 'other truths." For the one who believes and for the one who loves, there is no other truth and there is no other love.
So real love is always fated. It has been arranged from before time. It is the most meticulously prepared of coincidences. And fate, of course, is simply the secular term for the will of God, and coincidence for His grace.
pages 66,67
The Mystery Of Marriage
Mike Mason
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