i am always amazed at how today’s second reading never fails to reach into the inner depths of my heart, and reaffirms my beliefs for each new day. what i find very important are not the too frequently quoted lines for weddings and valentine’s day, but its preceding lines. these lines, personally, is the critical message and sets the context for the subsequent descriptive of love.
“If I speak in human and angelic tongues,
but do not have love,
I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.
And 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.
If 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.”
– 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
love. i think this is the only way we can lead our lives, and how we should treat each other. i hope that we may never be too caught up with the peripherals of life. all things are meant to lead to love; love leads us to God. over-zealousness and self-importance lead to competition, anger, irrationality and discord. i am nothing like that yet, especially judging from my responses to the whole profession practice saga. but let us pray that we can find the ability to love each new day.
“If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing;
if tongues, they will cease;
if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.
For we know partially and we prophesy partially,
but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
When 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.
At 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.
So faith, hope, love remain, these three;
but the greatest of these is love.”
– 1 Corinthians 13:8-13
