This is U2
I so often have songs flying around in my head, like butterflies waiting for my net of concentration to grab them and post them on a board for all to see. So it goes with these songs-- sometimes I catch on and I cannot let it go; I cannot help from singing it.
Today, it is U2's "One." I'm sure most of you know it, but it was the song that was playing as I posted the next entry (see This is Not All in My Head). Enjoy.
Is it getting better, or do you feel the same?
Will it make it easier on you, now you got someone to blame?
You say one love, one life, when it's one need in the night.
One love, we get to share it. Leaves you baby if you don't care for it.
Did I disappoint you or leave a bad taste in your mouth?
You act like you never had love and you want me to go without.
Well, it's too late tonight to drag the past out into the light.
We're one, but we're not the same. We get to carry each other, carry each other...
Have you come here for forgiveness,
Have you come to raise the dead
Have you come here to play Jesus to the lepers in your head?
Did I ask too much, more than a lot
You gave me nothing, now it's all I got.
We're one, but we're not the same.
Well, we hurt each other, then we do it again.
You say love is a temple, love a higher law
Love is a temple, love the higher law.
You ask me to enter, but then you make me crawl
And I can't be holding on to what you got, when all you got is hurt.
One love, one blood, one life, you got to do what you should.
One life with each other: sisters, brothers.
One life, but we're not the same.
We get to carry each other, carry each other.
One, one.
posted by Father Anthony Gerber @ 10:36 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
Valerie,
I think you're right on. It is so difficult to analyze and encapsulate this song into one single message, but I think you have pretty much done that.
Admittedly, there is a lot going on here. We have someone struggling with conversion in "is it getting better, or do you feel the same"-- for, if you are receiving God's grace (which those who are in the process of converting to God painfully see), then one wonders: will this make my life easier (better)?
Well, God's love (and therefore God's call) does not make life easier, but it does make life better.
Of course, there are things that want to convince us that God's love is not worth it: that this love exists, but there is still need ("you say one love, one life, when it's one need in the night"), or that this love, if we don't reciprocate it, disappears ("leaves you baby if you don't care for it").
Likewise, there are those who say that this love is hypocritical because it is so challenging ("You act like you never had love and you want me to go without") or are somehow disappointed by it ("did I dissapoint you or leave a bad taste in your mouth").
The question is: Is God's love (and thus its calling) worth it when it "gave me nothing, now it's all I got"?
So, yeah, this is a song about a guy struggling with God's love, because he wonders why Christ came and how anyone can do what Christ asks. The guy almost despairs when he says "And I can't be holding on to what you got, when all you got is hurt."
But, yet the line "we get to carry each other, carry each other" gives us, the audience, hope that the guy has come back to accept Christ's love; for, when U2 says "we GET to carry each other" we see that to help and to love others as Christ did IS IN FACT A GIFT. We are bestowed a great grace, a great gift, a great opportunity, a great love (whatever we wish to call it) to help others, to share Christ's love, to participate in that mission to love as Christ loved.
So yeah... I really didn't have an opinion on the matter (haha)
And by the way, Valerie, I love you.
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