Chocolate melts, roses wilt, heart decorations come down. Even as a child, I sensed that love refuses to stay simple, neat, or predictable. Valentine’s Day passed quickly, but the questions it raised about love lingered much longer. I learned early that love could be layered and complicated, especially when it did not match what was considered ideal. In sixth-grade religion class, that understanding collided with something much harder to name.
That year, we learned about the ideal Catholic life: marriage between a man and a woman, obedience to Church rules, membership in a parish, and full participation in the sacraments. It was taught as a checklist, clear and absolute. My family fit only some of it. At the time, I did not yet have the language to separate classroom teaching from broader faith. I had not yet realized that Church with a capital C could differ from church with a lowercase c, and the lesson became, in my mind, a judgment from God. When the teacher said we would never fully receive the Eucharist if we did not follow all the rules, I felt completely alone. I sat at my desk, fluorescent lights humming, realizing no one else seemed unsettled. I had questions I could not ask and fears I could not name.
Twelve-year-old me stayed after class and cried. I was terrified I would never fully belong, not in my Church, not in my community, not even in God’s love. My world was full of love, and I could not understand how that could be seen as wrong in the place I found comfort. I believed something essential about my life and family made us unworthy. The lesson did not end when the bell rang. It followed me home, shaping my understanding of faith as fragile and conditional.
My family never fit the “typical” picture. I grew up with three moms, one dad, and two households I moved between every other day. Each house had its own rhythms, routines, and personalities. Packing a bag became routine. Mom or dad would drive me to the other house or meet halfway for the classic divorced parent drop-off. My car became a quiet container for the pieces of my life that traveled with me, but moving between homes required constant adjustment. I learned early how to read rooms, shift expectations, and hold my values steady even as each environment asked something different of me.
That movement taught me flexibility, awareness, and independence. It also taught me that love could remain constant even when everything else shifted. Love lived in the consistency of showing up, in rides across town, in shared meals that had to be scheduled between friends in different cities. It lived in conversations about homework, family lore, and quiet encouragement before big moments. Even when I questioned where I belonged, love was present, steady, a tether through chaos, a quiet signal that I was seen.
Outside of family, I kept myself constantly in motion, filling my time with rehearsals, practices, and plans with friends. Stillness left too much room to feel, and I always felt deeply. For a long time, I tried to manage that intensity, but over time, I learned to trust it. Feeling deeply is not a flaw. It allows me to notice, listen closely, and respond with care, and it became the foundation for the communities I gravitated toward and how I showed up in them.
I grew up loving music and performance. In studios filled with mirrors, music, and shared exhaustion, I learned discipline, trust, and care. Someone almost always noticed when you were off balance or when exhaustion set in. Support was woven into the work itself, and I learned that belonging could be built through shared effort.
Summers at my mom’s camper on Lake Erie offered another kind of community. Days revolved around the lake’s green waters, familiar meals, campground-wide events, and the comfort of returning each year. Independence was prominent and evolved as I grew, but connection was constant. Neighbors checked in, stories were shared, time moved more slowly, and afternoons were scented with sunscreen and the grill. From those summers, I learned that belonging does not require sameness. It grows through tradition, beauty in nature, laughter, and the willingness to return.
During sixth-grade religion class, I believed faith demanded conformity. I feared where that left me and the love I had for my family. As I grew older, studied religion, and spoke with people whose faith was rooted in advocacy, equality, and personal journeys, my understanding shifted. I now attend a Catholic Marianist university, where belief is framed not as perfection but as practice. Faith is expressed through care, presence, and creating space for others. I no longer see my family’s love as something that disqualifies us from God. Instead, I see it as evidence of God’s presence. Faith and justice no longer feel like opposing forces; they inform one another.
Holidays made my family’s difference especially clear. One Christmas Eve, I attended four separate celebrations across Northeast Ohio, moving from house to house with coats, gifts, and half-finished conversations. The day was exhausting and carefully coordinated, yet never empty. Each stop was filled with warmth, laughter, and intention. That experience taught me that families are not defined by simplicity or symmetry. They are defined by effort, repetition, and care. Love does not weaken when it stretches; it multiplies.
Summer at Camp Christopher made love and belonging tangible. Each week, the oldest girls left pink handprints on the OJG Rock, a bittersweet farewell marking both an ending and a promise to stay connected. I watched counselors and friends support one another through games, meals, whispered conversations, and small gestures of recognition. Care was never loud or performative but consistent, intentional, patient, and rooted in presence. Through camp, I learned that love rooted in faith is expressed through steady presence and shared responsibility, not rigid expectations.
Over the years, I slowly absorbed the message that parts of me needed to be tempered. My care was sometimes labeled overwhelming. My feelings arrived with intensity. My passion for justice was sometimes seen as disruptive, and my questions about faith were not always welcomed. I learned how to quiet myself, adjust my tone, and take up less space depending on where I was standing.
In public high school, my life unfolded across distinct worlds that rarely overlapped. Bible studies and faith groups existed separately from my advocacy work: mental health initiatives, district DEI boards, and LGBTQ+ student-led representation. On the surface, I moved between communities with ease, genuinely valuing the people in each, but I found myself changing parts of who I was to fit what each group expected, not for personal gain but out of a desire to belong and preserve peace.
The tension was obvious. Sitting with peers whose faith was central, I knew they believed in God as I did but held explicit views about LGBTQ+ people. At the time, I did not consider myself committed to organized religion, but I knew God had helped me and loved the sacred aspects of Catholicism I’d been raised on. In Spectrum, my LGBTQ+ club, I occasionally felt judgment toward religious people, sometimes warranted, sometimes reductive, although they were intrigued by my testimony. Witnessing misrepresentation and weaponization of Christ in public spaces and everyday life made me furious, and I struggled to reconcile these worlds. I did not want to hide my family dynamic, yet for a long time, I did. I was meticulous the first few times I shared it, weighing each word, anticipating every reaction. Luckily, my public school classmates had such a range of family stories that those who mattered never made me feel embarrassed or inferior, and others’ opinions faded into irrelevance.
Slowly, I stopped separating myself into compartments. I realized that faith did not demand silence, and advocacy did not negate belief. Compassion became the foundation for justice work, and commitment to justice clarified my understanding of faith. I reminded both spaces, when it mattered, that individuals cannot be reduced to a single identity, that love and allegiance are complex, and that belonging is not earned by conformity but built through consistent attention, honesty, and care.
Looking back, each of these spaces: my family homes, dance studios, lake summers, camp, and school, has taught me a version of love that is active, lived, and intricate. It is not tidy or always predictable, but it is persistent, adaptable, and generous. It grows through laughter and tears, whispered words and shouted cheers, shared routines and stolen glances. It exists in coordination and compromise, in showing up even when inconvenient, in naming injustice, offering support, and holding space for difference. Love endures because it is practiced over and over in rooms filled with music, sunlight, or fluorescent lights, across water and snow, wherever people choose to appear fully.
For anyone reading this who has been told, directly or quietly, that their love is somehow incomplete because it does not fit a prescribed structure, I want to say clearly that your love is not lesser or lacking. Love does not lose its holiness because it looks different, moves differently, or exists outside of what is considered traditional. For people of faith in particular, justice requires a reimagining of belonging, one that centers presence over performance and care over conformity. If love is patient, attentive, and committed, it is already doing sacred work. Belonging should not be rationed to those who fit neatly into inherited definitions. On a day that asks us to celebrate love, it is worth remembering that love’s value is not measured by its visibility or approval, but by its capacity to show up, to endure, and to make room for others.
Maria Kramer is a Human Rights Studies and Communication double major with a concentration in Public Relations at the University of Dayton. She is interested in the intersections of faith, justice, and belonging, and loves advocacy, writing, music, and dance. Outside of class, she enjoys watching movies, deep conversations with friends, people watching, fan-girling over pop artists, and spending summers by Lake Erie.
Unbound Social