I am new to the forum and moderation for my posts is taking a while - holidays not helping, maybe.
I have been married and divorced 3 times and I am married once again for life, now, since 2001.
I have been reading this forum quite a bit and being retrospective because my wife and I are in the process of officially joining the R. Catholic Church. Part of that process involves the (church) annulment of our previous marriages. A very detailed and lengthy procedure.
But rather than go into any specific details here on my own situations in the past - what I would like to mention is the great similarity I see in many (actually all) marriages/relationships and the great early debate in Christian theology of "works vs. faith" as the way to salvation of our souls, forever.
"Faith" and belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ is necessary for our salvation - per many, many verses in the Gospels. And "works" alone can NOT bring salvation and is unnecessary because Jesus died/atoned for all our sins with His greatest sacrifice. Nonetheless, works ARE deemed important in so many Gospel passages, as well as in Acts and many Epistles in the wisdom of Paul, Peter, and James. But only works IN SUPPORT OF FAITH - not as any kind of substitute. I.e. - one can't bargain with God and enter heaven "on our own terms because we EARNED it thru our "good works" alone."
In our purely human love relationships - the feeling/belief another person loves is always based on faith. For none of us can know what is truly in the hearts of our beloved of absolute factual certainty. We ALL must have faith in that other person's love for us - but such presumed knowledge is only reinforced by "works" - the actions of our beloved that indicate their love is indeed true. (Note how infidelity plays into this so terribly in so many ways.) But THEY are in the same situation as we are - we must constantly validate and revalidate our own love for them thru positive works THAT SUPPORT OUR LOVE (rather than our "needs" or our "desires" or really anything "me, me, me") and in the ways that they understand. This is where "love thy neighbor as thyself" comes in - but always remember this NT version of the Golden Rule comes SECOND to "the greatest commandment of the Law - is love God with your entire heart, soul, and mind." It is this "loving God" first which defines an external objective moral base that everyone (who at least studies the Bible - Old and New Testaments) can relate too and understand and meaningfully talk about. Pity all those poor modern secularists/atheists who deny ANY objective external morality and only believe in "subjective" or "relative" morality where everyone has their own personal definition of right and wrong, of what "love" is, what even the "Golden Rule" means.
With these ideas as a starting point now revisit Paul's wonderful definition of "love" in First Corinthians - as a pragmatic philosophic definition vs. "just" Christian religion (or ANY kind of "religious superstition.") God is not mentioned in these famous "love verses" - nor is "great sex", "intimacy", "emotional needs fulfillment", or even "great provider" - but many concrete examples of how we as human beings can show other human beings that "yes, I really do love you."
