Rev. Andrea Bozzolo: “Love is about who we are, not just how we feel”.”

Andrea Bozzolo is the rector of the Pontifical Salesian University. D. in Classical Letters and in Systematic Theology, he participated with Fr. Fabio Rosini and Cardinal Kevin Farrel, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life, in a meeting with Cardinal Kevin Farrel, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life. study day on “the sacrament of Marriage, faith and the teaching world”.

During his speech, Father Bozzolo stressed the importance of moving away from a perspective that presents the sacrament of the sacrament of the Blessed Sacrament as a "sacrament of reconciliation". marriage as a mere contract, encouraging everyone to deepen their understanding of the beauty of this vocation and to share with young people stories that will help them understand this “path to fulfillment”.

After the study day, the rector of the university gave an interview to Omnes in which he talks about how to present the sacrament of marriage to young people and the role of priests in accompanying those who follow this path.

How can the Church propose marriage as «decisive» to young people who see empirical verification, living together before marriage, as the only reasonable step before commitment?

- The Church can address this question by interpreting what cohabitation expresses: the desire to put love to the test. The key is to show that love becomes definitive not through a prolonged test, but through a promise based on a truth greater than the couple themselves.

Marriage is definitive because it recognizes that love is not based on itself. Without this horizon, cohabitation runs the risk of remaining a provisional experiment. The task is to reveal that the sacrament is not a definitive step after certainty, but the act that makes lasting love truly possible.

How can we rehabilitate the idea that love has an ontological structure and is not just a private emotional contract?

- It is necessary to show that love is not only what one feels, but what reveals the meaning of existence. In loving another person, one not only experiences emotions, but encounters a call to give oneself and to receive oneself anew. This points to an ontological structure: love is about who we are, not just how we feel. Recovering this requires a language that connects experience and truth, showing that love always implies a promise, a destiny and a way of life that cannot be reduced to a private agreement.

How can we explain to a couple in love that loving God «above all things» is precisely what will protect their mutual love from failure?

- Loving God above all else does not detract from the love It frees it from impossible expectations. When the beloved becomes the absolute, love collapses under the weight of what no human being can give.

Recognizing God as the ultimate source and fullness of love allows each spouse to be welcomed as a gift, not possessed as a guarantee of happiness. In this way, faith protects love from illusion and resentment, rooting it in a promise that transcends both spouses and sustains them.

In your analysis of Genesis, you say that the man only discovers his «I» in front of the woman's «you». To what extent does this vision help to combat the «psychologization of affections» that encloses the individual in his own psychic well-being?

- This perspective shows that the self is not constructed internally, but emerges through encounter. The “I” emerges in relation to a “you” that cannot be reduced to one's own needs or projections.

This challenges the psychologization of emotions, which limits love to subjective well-being. Instead, love becomes a relational event that takes the person beyond him or herself.

Identity is discovered, not produced, and this opens a path in which emotions are integrated into a broader horizon of meaning and responsibility.

How to propose the Christian vision of marriage without the Church appearing to try to «colonize» or appropriate the universal human experience of love?

- The starting point is the universality of human love, recognizing it as something that already has meaning and points beyond itself. The Church does not impose an external interpretation, but reveals what is implicit in the experience: its openness to a higher origin and destiny. In this sense, the Christian vision does not colonize love, but serves it, helping it to recognize its full truth. The sacrament is not an add-on, but the explicit recognition of a presence that is already at work in the relationship.

How can pastoral care help spouses to see death not as the end of their love, but as the horizon where their covenant finds its ultimate meaning?

- Pastoral care can help couples understand that love carries within it a promise that transcends death. The experience of loving already raises the question of whether this good is destined to endure or to fade away. Faith answers that this promise is not an illusion, but finds its fullness in God.

Accompaniment helps couples to interpret their love within this horizon, so that death is not perceived as its negation, but as the step in which its deepest truth - communion grounded in God - reaches its fullness.

You affirm that «love is not simply a feeling,» but a fullness of being. In a culture that idolizes the emotion of the moment, what pedagogical tools do you propose to educate the will without falling into a rigid legalism?

- Education must focus on forming desire, not on repressing it. This means helping young people to recognize that true freedom does not consist in the multiplication of experiences, but in the ability to choose a good that lasts.

Stories, testimonies and shared reflection on lived experience are more effective than abstract rules. The will grows when it is attracted to a meaningful way of life.

To avoid legalism, it is necessary to show the beauty of faithful love, so that commitment is not perceived as a restriction, but as a path to fulfillment.

He warns that theology has focused almost exclusively on the «moment of juridical consent» of marriage. If we shift the focus to the «affective journey» before and after, how is the role of the priest redefined? Should he cease to be an «officiator of a contract» and become a «discerning partner» in a story that is already inhabited by God?

- If the emotional and relational journey is taken seriously, the role of the priest is expanded. He is no longer primarily the officiant of a juridical act, but a guide who helps to discern the presence of God, who is already at work in the couple's story. This does not detract from the importance of consent, but places it within a broader faith process.

The priest accompanies, interprets and supports a journey, helping the couple to recognize that their love is called to become a conscious and lasting response to God's initiative.