Love is Patient...

Today's second reading is one of my favorites. Every time I read or hear it, I get something new out of it.  Every time I read or hear it, I realize that it is just as relevant today as it was when it was written.  It helps to clarify just what true, authentic love is and how it can be shown.  I think this is a clarification that is desperately needed in our current times.

God bless...

1 Cor 13: 1-13

1If I speak in human and angelic tongues^* but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.^a2And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.^b3If I give away everything I own, and if I hand my body over so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.^c

4^* Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, [love] is not pompous, it is not inflated,^d5it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury,^e6it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.7It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.^f

8^* Love never fails. If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.9For we know partially and we prophesy partially,10but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.11When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things.12At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.^g13^* So faith, hope, love remain, these three;^h but the greatest of these is love.