As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. — John 15:9
All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. — John 1:3-4
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Lights spring into being, one after the other, because you ignite them. Each feeds the neighboring candle. Each flame take life from the lit before it and contains a spark of its antecedents.
Similarly, every form of love reflects some aspect of the greatest love: agape. Take friendship, for instance, which can also denote kinship. It has been called storge or filios.
In these days, you have reason to cherish friendship more than ever. The past eighteen months made people aware of how precious relationships have become.
Friendships endure. Grow and change. Expect much from you and yet allows for your mistakes and mishaps as you who try to get it right, but sometimes get it wrong. Friends are sometimes as close as family: they may even become the kindred you choose, as opposed to the families into which you are born.
Friendship fulfills part of the Gospel commandment to love your neighbors as yourself. When you look at people as friends, they stop seeming ‘other’ and become someone with whom you share respect and recognition.
Can you feel the heat from the four candles, which leap and flicker together, lean toward each other and spring apart, dancing, moving? Everything they touch is lovingly revealed and rendered by such intimate light. — Rev Gail
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Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage. — Lao Tzu
I will love the light for it shows me the way. – Og Mandino