Why We Should All Love With a Single Heart

This includes married people, single people and religious people

The word single has many connotations today. Ordinarily, we hear it when people ask why someone is not yet married. It seems to refer to people like me who have not entered either marriage or the religious life.

But I have learned that the word “single” can also have deeper meanings within the Bible itself. Take a look at the following verse:

“Teach me, Lord, your way
that I may walk in your truth,
single-hearted and revering your name.”
- Psalm 86:11, NABRE

While the word “single-hearted” was used in the above Bible version, another word was used in the following version:

“Teach me your way, O Lord,
that I may walk in your truth;
give me an undivided heart to revere your name.”
- Psalm 86:11, NRSVCE

Based on the above, the word single could also mean being undivided. Hence, to be “single-hearted” is the same as having an “undivided heart”.

When you’re in a romantic relationship, you understand how exclusivity is needed to protect your relationship. You can’t share your special someone with another person. (At least, not in the same way.) While your partner can have friends or close acquaintances, he or she must only have one “beloved”. Your partner cannot have an “undivided heart”.

I guess this principle applies to us human beings because it isn’t possible for us to love many people in the same way. We just can’t focus on more than one partner, can’t we? If we try to do so, we’d end up hurting everyone, including ourselves. We’d prefer one person over another or give more time and attention to another. If we must love our beloved, we must love with our whole heart, not with just half of our hearts.

When it comes to loving God, we should also do the same. For wasn’t it commanded to us by God Himself?

“You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment.”
- Matthew 22:37-38, NABRE

Whether we’re single or married or in the religious life, we must love God above all. We must love God with a “single heart”.

May we remember the kind of love we need in our relationship with God. No other thing should separate us from Him who alone is the source of our true happiness in life. Love Him today with all of your heart. And let that love flow to everyone else around you, blessing every other heart that it touches along the way.

“You cannot be half a saint. You must be a whole saint or no saint at all.”—St. Therese of Lisieux

O, let me love with a love
that knows how to be single;
Let me love with a love,
that is focused on You.
Let me hold on to things that last,
let my soul never waver
and my steps never falter.
For You are wisdom and truth and beauty,
You are joy and light that never fades.
Let me love with a heart
that is undivided,
for only then will my soul
be whole.
Only then will I find joy
that lasts forevermore.