Love: An Indicator of Personal Maturity. A Philosophical and Pedagogical Perspective

The article is a philosophical analysis of the problem of love from the perspective of human maturity. It aims to recall the philosophical theses (including those by Aristotle, Pieper, Plato, and Wojtyla) that are pedagogically oriented. The article consists of six parts, arranged in six questions, which allow us to define love as a pedagogically desirable attitude. The ontic factors of love are primarily considered, but so too is the contemporary cultural situation that constitutes a context of human relationships. The determinants of this context are individualism, consumerism, metaphysical indifference, and more recently also pandemic-induced isolationism. In Part 1, love is defined as the „being together” of people governed by a personalistic norm. In Part 2, the emphasis is on its corporeal-sensual-spiritual complexity and, in particular, on the aptitude of the will and the intellect. Part 3 considers the principle of love: love is governed by an affirmation, not of a personal feature (or set of features), but of the person’s existence as a person. In Part 4, love is analyzed in terms of its inherent aspect of giving: giving to someone and being given to. Attention is drawn to the need to combine both attitudes in mature love. Part 5 is about friendship, the most perfect form of love. It is noted that although it binds a small group of people (it is exclusive), it also has a socially-oriented vector. Part 6 is devoted to the issue of the deficit of love (indifference, hatred) and its sources in the decline of existential thinking among contemporary people.

The article is a philosophical analysis of the problem of love from the perspective of human maturity. It aims to recall the philosophical theses (including those by Aristotle, Pieper, Plato, and Wojtyla) that are pedagogically oriented. The article consists of six parts, arranged in six questions, which allow us to define love as a pedagogically desirable attitude. The ontic factors of love are primarily considered, but so too is the contemporary cultural situation that constitutes a context of human relationships. The determinants of this context are individualism, consumerism, metaphysical indifference, and more recently also pandemic-induced isolationism. In Part 1, love is defined as the „being together” of people governed by a personalistic norm. In Part 2, the emphasis is on its corporeal-sensual-spiritual complexity and, in particular, on the aptitude of the will and the intellect. Part 3 considers the principle of love: love is governed by an affirmation, not of a personal feature (or set of features), but of the person’s existence as a person. In Part 4, love is analyzed in terms of its inherent aspect of giving: giving to someone and being given to. Attention is drawn to the need to combine both attitudes in mature love. Part 5 is about friendship, the most perfect form of love. It is noted that although it binds a small group of people (it is exclusive), it also has a socially-oriented vector. Part 6 is devoted to the issue of the deficit of love (indifference, hatred) and its sources in the decline of existential thinking among contemporary people.