lessons from Carl, Ellie and Paul
Describing or defining love is complicated. Last week, I asked several of my patients, “What is love?” Some answers were simple, and one belongs in a college paper, but perhaps the best was a four-year-old who said, “Ask my mom.” One patient said love is when you “really, really like someone.” Another child pointed out the obvious problem when she said, “I love my mom, and I love ice cream.” Love is a complicated thing.
The opening scene of the movie Up is one of the most moving portrayals of the complicated nature of love. The scene is titled “Married Life” and recounts Carl and Ellie’s relationship from their wedding day to Carl’s return to an empty house after Ellie’s funeral. It reveals a young couple’s journey through life, including their plans, dreams, hopes, disappointments, and the reality of everyday life. Their story demonstrates because-of love, alongside-of love, and in spite-of love. They experience attachment, caring, intimacy, passion, and commitment. Carl and Ellie’s story of love doesn’t end at her death. It continues through the rest of the movie. It’s my favorite story of love and always makes me cry, even while writing this essay.
Christians often look to Paul’s description of love:
Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.1
Here, Paul describes love by listing the attributes it displays and those it avoids. Carl and Ellie’s love fits Paul’s definition. Each of them is patient and kind with the other. They don’t resent each other when learning they won’t have children, demonstrating hope toward a future goal while enduring life’s difficulties. Ultimately, Carl’s love for Ellie “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, [and] endures all things” throughout the rest of the movie.
If you’ve never seen Up, you should watch it. If you have, you should watch it again. If you’re at all like me, you’ll cry. Several times. It has a lot to say about love in what you see and what you don’t see in their relationship. One thing jumps out at me: neither Carl nor Ellie insists on their own way. Paul says love doesn’t do that. Carl and Ellie agree.
Even though Carl and Ellie never have children, their story applies to parents. Sometimes, authoritarian parents take a coercive position of power and say, “I’m doing this out of love for your own good.” Most of the time, they insist on their way without considering the child’s input and justify it by thinking their action is for the child’s good. They think they love their children. But love doesn’t seek its own way. It doesn’t try to coerce another. John Cobb and David Ray Griffin say that their theology of divine love matches psychology and the general human experience in saying, “If we truly love others, we do not seek to control them. We do not seek to pressure them with promises and threats involving extrinsic rewards and punishments.”2 This observation applies to all relationships, including the romantic relationship between Carl and Ellie, the relationship between parents and children, and the relationship between God and creation.
An alternative to coercion is empowerment. Kathlyn Breazeale calls this alternative mutual empowerment in marriage relationships and encourages marriage partners to give and receive while focusing on empowering the other through their relationship.3 The “Married Life” scene presents a simple example of mutual empowerment. Early in the scene, Ellie encourages Carl to reach the top of the hill, while their roles reverse near the end as Carl assists Ellie in reaching the peak.
The idea of empowerment also applies to the relationship between parents and their children. Most parents want to empower their children by teaching them new skills and helping them learn to navigate the world. The idea of mutual empowerment goes a step further. Using it, parents work toward overall well-being for the child and the family, ensuring they include the child’s input and perspective as they develop their goals. Using this approach, the parents avoid “insisting on their own way.”
New parents quickly learn that complete coercion of their children is not possible. When offered a nipple, newborns often latch and feed without putting up a fuss. But sometimes, something doesn’t go right, they don’t latch, and everyone becomes frustrated. Similar scenes play out with fifteen-month-old diaper changes and two-year-old potty training. These situations end much better when parents try to understand, receive, and react to the child’s input. The plan can be slightly modified with a creative response, giving a new, attainable goal for everyone’s good.
Although it is ideal to avoid coercive control altogether, parents must occasionally enforce protective boundaries by “insisting on their own way.” When a child is about to step in front of an oncoming car, the parent will instinctively physically coerce the child by picking them up and returning them to safety. These momentary uses of coercive control should be used as a last resort when an empowerment approach is impossible.
Because “God is love”4 and love doesn’t “insist on its own way,” divine love is always empowering and never coercive. In every moment, God seeks to persuade everyone and everything toward divine aspirations that lead to overall well-being. God doesn’t coerce creation by insisting on God’s own way.
Paul’s description of love is not a complete definition. It doesn’t address how loving your mom differs from loving ice cream. However, it does give us insight into some aspects of love, including the idea that love doesn’t insist on its own way. This is true for marriage, parental, and divine love.
- I Cor. 13:4-7 (NRSV).
↩︎ - John B. Cobb Jr and David Ray Griffin, Process Theology: An Introductory Exposition (Louisville, KY: Westminster Press, 1976), 53–54.
↩︎ - Kathlyn Breazeale, Mutual Empowerment: A Theology of Marriage, Intimacy, and Redemption (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2008), 9–10.
↩︎ - I Jn. 4:16.
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image: Up. Directed by Pete Docter. Pixar. 2009. Walt Disney Stuidos Motion Pictures. 2009. Used for comment and analysis.
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