Love and Responsibility Quotes

I finished reading Love and Responsibility by John Paul II (before he was pope) and, even though it was pretty dense and philosophical, I loved it. It helped me understand basic things about love, it helped me in my own personal relationship and it is definitely a book I will go back to for reference. 

Here are a few of my favorite quotes: 

• "The sexual urge in this conception is a natural drive born in all human beings, a vector of aspiration along which their whole existence develops and perfects itself from within." p. 46
• "The only way to surmount the element of uti is to embrace simultaneously the alternative, fundamentally different, defined by St Augustine as frui. There exists a joy which is consonant both with the nature of the sexual urge and with the dignity of human persons, a joy which results from collaboration, from mutual understanding and the harmonious realization of jointly chosen aims, in the broad field of action which is love between man and woman." p. 61
• "It should be emphasized here that love is the fullest realization of the possibilities inherent in man. The potential inherent in the person is most fully actualized through love. The person finds in love the greatest possible fullness of being, of objective existence. Love is an activity, a deed which develops the existence of the person to its fullest. It must of course be genuine love." p. 82
• "A woman is capable of truly making a gift of herself only if she fully believes in the value of her person and in the value as a person of the man to whom she gives herself. And a man is capable of fully accepting a woman's gift of herself only if he is fully conscious of the magnitude of the gift - which he cannot be unless he affirms the value of her person." p. 129
• "For love is never something ready made, something merely 'given' to man and woman, it is always at the same time a 'task' which they are set." p. 139
• "For this reason genuine human love, love 'for' a person, and love 'between' persons, must combine two elements: tenderness and a certain firmness. Otherwise, it will lose its inner soundness and resilience, and turn into sterile sloppiness and mawkishness. We must not forget that love for a human being must also contain certain elements of struggle. Struggle for the beloved human being, and his or her true good." p. 204
• "Without integration marriage is an enormous risk. A man and a woman whose love has not begun to mature, has not established itself as a genuine union of persons, should not marry, for they are not ready to undergo the test to which married life will subject them." p. 215
• "But the need for betrothed love, the need to give oneself to and unite with another person, is deeper and connected with the spiritual existence of the person. It is not finally and completely satisfied by union with another human being." p. 253