Alongside the Christian love, in which we are
called to love all people (Matthew 22:37-39, John 13:3-35), we tend to love
people in two ways; we love some because they are wonderful people and we enjoy
what they bring to our lives, and we try to love the less wonderful people
because it is better for them (and us, of course) that they are loved. To that
end, love of country is really love of people - like one tries to love friends,
work colleagues and acquaintances - because the official nature of a country
(governments, politics, institutions, media, culture, business, etc) are more
like transactions between systems than connections between individuals.
Consequently, I think love for country really means love for people who we’d ordinarily choose to love, because there are plenty of people in every country who we find it harder to love and are not naturally inclined towards them. But then the opposite to the first kind of love is the failure to love those who are not like us, and that is the less Divine kind, and goes against the Christian virtues of God’s love. And once that has set in, it becomes more likely that people will develop a dislike of ‘otherness’ - those who are not like them, which is when patriotism can easily descend into nationalism, and even racism, bigotry and intolerance.
But it won’t do to just write off everyone concerned about immigration as being of the latter kind, because it is quite possible to love everyone in the first sense and the second sense, but still remember that a country is very much like a sort of business transaction where it is not always prudent to have uncontrolled immigration, or let in people who values are opposed to and dangerous towards our own. Therefore, love of country in the healthy kind can also mean, and sometimes should mean, that the best way to love individuals in one’s own country is to have a sensible immigration policy, not a reckless open-door policy under the dubious and insincere pretext of being merely seen to be virtuous, tolerant and welcoming.
