Jun P. Espina 3 min read
Updated on February 17th, 2020
Valentine’s Day
Today is Valentine’s Day, a feast of Saint Valentine to a few Christian denominations—the day we traditionally send flowers or love notes or a valentine’s card or a text message to our special loved one. The question is: Is it relevant today? Is it meaningful? Is it necessary?
Wikipedia says that “The first recorded association of Valentine’s Day with romantic love is in Parlement of Foules (1382) by Geoffrey Chaucer. Chaucer wrote: “For this was on seynt Volantynys day Whan euery bryd comyth there to chese his make. [‘For this was on Saint Valentine’s Day, when every bird cometh there to choose his mate.’]”
I like Chaucer’s description of Valentine’s Day: “to choose his mate.” Or, that Valentine’s Day is the special day for lovers or married people or for someone who’s in love (definitely not the kind of love you have for your sick grandfather, neither that so-called love for the same sex—but rather, for the opposite sex!). It is the day you and your sweetheart would want to have more fun together, more celebration to your relationship.
Is Valentine’s Day Important and Necessary?
Well, it depends on your objective in celebrating it. If you want to spend your Valentine’s Day with someone you want to cheat or for the sake of lust and money, then yours is not Valentine’s Day, but Love-cheating Day!
Valentine’s Day survives and is honored, since it was a Christian tradition about those faithful church leaders whose names were Valentinus (see Wikipedia). Valentine’s Day emerged from the two-thousand-year history of Christian faith, love and martyrdom. If your Valentine’s Day is all about impregnating a girl, then leaving her alone (because you don’t have a sense of responsibility and a sense of good!) to have a miserable future, then yours is not Valentine’s Day. Call it “Sex Day” or whatever; it is not the meaning of Valentine’s Day.
Is Valentine’s Day important and necessary? Yes, it is, since it is all about love and love is important and necessary. My piece of unsolicited advice to those who don’t have Valentine’s Partner yet is: work hard to be married to the real someone! Why the right person? Well, because of this immortal line from a song: “O, how it’s sad to belong to someone else, when the right one comes along.”
But why get married, when to be single and free is always better? Well, wrong. I wrote somewhere in this site something like: “It is Not Good for the Man to be Alone.” Really, it’s true. Without a family is the worse thing that will ever happen to a person. Of course, you would start to believe in my conviction once you will reach age 60 and unmarried. Think about that tragedy—those future loveless and miserable and dying years of yours!
Is Valentine’s Day relevant?
Yes, it is, because love is always relevant. If you are without love, then you are someone more irrelevant and unnatural. Don’t despair, however, if your staying single and loveless is due to lack of opportunity. Marriage, after all, is an opportunity. But also remember that while foolish men wait for opportunities to come by, wise men make them; they make good opportunities!
There is one success secret in all forms of endeavor. It is the Law of Attraction. Simply put, it says that while success attracts success, failure also attracts failure. You can never marry the right person if the thoughts of your own heart are wrong, selfish, vindictive, full of hate, full of negative ideas about marriage, children, and having a family!
What is your best agenda for today’s celebration?
Well, forget about the expense, because true love does not live on the bed of money. Saying “I love you” honestly to the one you loved today is priceless. Wrote Charles M. Schulz: “All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn’t hurt.”
To the men out there, my advice is to be careful about your money today, for God doesn’t support love for money:
All About Valentine’s Day from Wikipedia
“Saint Valentine’s Day, commonly known as Valentine’s Day, or the Feast of Saint Valentine, is observed on February 14 each year. It is celebrated in many countries around the world, although it remains a working day in most of them. St. Valentine’s Day began as a liturgical celebration of one or more early Christian saints named Valentinus. The most popular martyrology associated with Saint Valentine was that he was imprisoned for performing weddings for soldiers who were forbidden to marry and for ministering to Christians, who were persecuted under the Roman Empire; during his imprisonment, he is said to have healed the daughter of his jailer Asterius. Legend states that before his execution he wrote “from your Valentine” as a farewell to her. Today, Saint Valentine’s Day is an official feast day in the Anglican Communion, as well as in the Lutheran Church. The Eastern Orthodox Church also celebrates Saint Valentine’s Day, albeit on July 6th and July 30th, the former date in honor of the Roman presbyter Saint Valentine, and the latter date in honor of Hieromartyr Valentine, the Bishop of Interamna (modern Terni).
“The day was first associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished. By the 15th century, it had evolved into an occasion in which lovers expressed their love for each other by presenting flowers, offering confectionery, and sending greeting cards (known as “valentines”). Valentine’s Day symbols that are used today include the heart-shaped outline, doves, and the figure of the winged Cupid. Since the 19th century, handwritten valentines have given way to mass-produced greeting cards.”
