Thinking about what love is

She told him, “When I was in college I read a folktale about a father pursuing a son who’d run far away, from one world to the next. The father called to him, ‘Please come back!’ But the son looked across the great gulf between them and shouted to him, ‘I can’t go that far!’ So his father yelled to his son, ‘Then just come back halfway!’ But his boy replied, ‘I can’t go back halfway!’ And finally his father shouted, ‘Walk back as far as you can! I’ll go the rest of the way!’”
--Atticus, by Ron Hansen

But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.
--Parable of the Prodigal Son, Luke 15:20 NRSV

(Image: from Rembrandt's Prodigal Son)