Falling in love and staying in love is not just a feeling. It takes work. The Christian understanding of love is to be willing to lay down your life for your beloved. As the years go by in our faith life and relationships, it’s easy for our love to go on autopilot. If we don’t nurture our relationship with God and our loved ones, those relationships will reach a place of complacency. In romantic relationships, the romance starts to fade. Remember the cross of love, “the horizontal and the vertical”—with our earthly neighbors and our heavenly father. Christian love requires reaching out to others and maintaining a relationship with God above. Christianity is a love story. As G.K. Chesterton said, “Let your religion be less of a theory and more of a love affair.” God was our first love. Before we loved anything else he loved us first. But we’ve lost touch with that innocence, that relationship. As St. John wrote: “I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first” (Revelation 2:4). Many of us experienced a reconnection with God later in life, after we had loved other people and things, but that reconnection then faded. Reactivate that relationship with God by being active in your love. What’s one thing you can do horizontally to cultivate the romance in your life with your spouse, fiancé, or significant other? And what’s one thing you can do vertically to cultivate your love and faith in God? Remember the Cross, because it is the key to getting love right in all aspects of life. MORE FROM ASCENSION Ascension’s main website: http://ascensionpress.com Ascension Media: https://media.ascensionpress.com The Great Adventure Bible: https://ascensionpress.com/collections/featured/products/the-great-adventure-catholic-bible SOCIAL MEDIA Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AscensionPress/ Twitter: http://twitter.com/AscensionPress LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ascension-press Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/catholicfaithformation/ Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/c/ascensionpresents