=ThE wOrLd Is FiLLeD wItH GoOd N EvIl PeOplE=

love is patient
2004-04-09 - 10:41 p.m.

Love is Patient

St Paul places "love is patient" way ahead of all other

virtues like kindness, compassion, courtesy, generosity and

humility. Why does St Paul stress that patience is the first and

foremost definition of love? Has St Paul got it all wrong? Is love

possible without patience? Is patience all that important?

In our fast paced modern life, we have to complete our

projects ahead of competitors. We carry this behavior trait back to

our family and we are impatient when we do not get our way. We

expect our spouse to cater to us immediately after one reminder or

two. When we don't get what we want and at the time desired, we

become irritated or angry. But being patient means allowing,

accommodating and accepting the other person's ideas, values,

personality and mannerism. So we need to constantly remind

ourselves: "Am I loving when I don't accommodate my spouse's ways?

Do I show love when I don't accept my spouse's point of view?" We

know for certain that we do not practice love at that particular

moment since a loving heart is a patient heart.

Little things inevitably happen in our lives and in our

homes. Misunderstanding and conflict come to every home. During such

moments, we get angry and sulk. We tend to blame: Why must I suffer

the hurt and tantrum? Why should I bear the injury? Why must I

endure the accusation? Why should I accept the slight? But, for any

family relationship to flourish we need patience to humbly resolve

the conflict. And, patience means accepting, bearing, enduring,

over-looking, suffering the slights, shortcomings, blame,

accusation, tantrums, injuries and hurts, without retaliation. Thus

we must regularly ask: "Am I spending time to patiently cultivate

the family relationship? Have I been patient to grow our

relationship? Do I neglect to improve our relationship because I am

impatient?

So how do we cultivate this most vital definition of love

by St Paul? In order to be able to develop this loving patience we

have to learn to forgive readily and endlessly. As Mother Teresa

said, "if we really want to love, we must learn to forgive before

anything else." (One heart full of love, 113) "We must make our

homes centers of compassion and forgive endlessly." ("A Gift for

God", 18) St Paul says, "Be tolerant with one another and forgive

one another whenever any one of you has a complaint against someone

else."(Colossians 3:13)

The passages below are taken from the book, "Our Lady says:

Love People" by Rev. Albert Joseph Mary Shamon.

Love Is Patient (1 Corinthians. 13:4)

The Greek word Paul uses for patience is makrothumei. This

word means patience with people, not patience with circumstances,

like sickness, poverty, or death.

Paul was writing to the Corinthians--to people who needed

to have patience with other people. Therefore, to his classic

description of love, we can add a preposition plus people to each of

his 14 descriptive words for love. Thus, love is patient--with

people; love is kind--to people; love is not jealous--of people,

etc.

Charlie Brown once said: "Mankind I love; people I hate."

But it is people we have to contend with. When people get close

together, there is bound to be personality friction, for no two

persons are alike. Rub two pieces of wood together, and you will

have fire. Put people together under the same roof, in the same

office or in the same parish or in the same house, like husband and

wife, parents and children, and you will have plenty of fuel for a

good fight.

A feuding married couple went to a priest for counseling.

The priest sat at his desk, and the couple sat opposite him, and a

cat and dog sat placidly by the desk. When the priest had finished

his counseling, he concluded with these words: "Joe and Mary, why

can't you get along like this cat and dog?" Joe quipped, "Father,

tie them together and see how long they'll stay that way."

As cars need a lubricant to keep parts that rub against

other parts, like the pistons in the motor, from freezing fast, so

people need a lubricant to keep them living smoothly together. That

lubricant is the virtue of patience.

Our blessed Lord asked us to imitate His patience. "Learn from me,"

He said, "for I am gentle and humble of heart" (Matt. 11:29). Our

Lord, as far as we know, never had any physical ailments. He did not

have to put up with bodily sickness. But He had to put up with

people.

People afflict us in two different ways: some afflict us

unwittingly, and some afflict us by their behavior. I often think of

how hard it must have been for Our Lord to have had only the

apostles for companions. He was the Word of God, divine

intelligence. They were illiterate fisherman; goodwilled, indeed,

but often so obtuse when it came to understanding Him. Right up to

the night before He died, He did not seem to get through to them. To

Philip He said, "After I have been with you all this time, you still

do not know me?" (John 14:9). The same misunderstanding surfaced

again after the Last Supper when He was talking to them about their

mission, So, with divine patience, Jesus finally says, "Enough"

(Luke 22:38). Always, He was so gentle with them, for "love is

patient."

How often we may have thought that the people around us are

stupid or do stupid things. Have you ever said, "He or she drives me

up a wall!" "He or she means well, but they get on my nerves." Or

you complain, "Why they would make holy Job lose his patience." You

are really losing yours when you so think.

Then there are other people who afflict us just by their

behavior. They are arrogant, self-righteous, judgmental, like the

Pharisee in the parable of the Pharisee and the tax-collector (Luke

18:9-14). They look down on others, are snobbish, condemn others,

spurn them, speak evil against them. That was the way most scribes

and Pharisees treated Jesus.

He could have hit back, but He did not. And that is what

patience really is.

Patience means accepting, enduring, suffering (that is

where the word came from: patiens means "suffering") the slights,

injuries, hurts inflicted by people--suffering them for the love of

God.

What makes patience a virtue is its motive: love of God.

''Love is patient," that is, true Christian patience has to be an

_expression of love, of love of God.

A salesman puts up with all kinds of abuse--just to make a

sale.

Indians used to endure frightful tortures--just to become

"a brave,"

Stoics suppressed their feelings--just to be considered

"manly."

Such endurance may be laudable, but it is not necessarily

virtuous.

"Love is patient," that is, true patience must be an

_expression of love, of love of God. It is that motive which makes

all endurance a virtue. It is not what we do that counts, but why;

not the mountains we move, but the motives that impel us to move

them.

True Christian patience puts up with others just as God

puts up with us. He lets His sun shine on good and bad alike and His

rain fall on the just and the unjust. (Matthew 5:45). With God there

is no favoritism (Romans 2:11).

Christian love must be like that. God loves all and always

has their highest good at heart. Our Lady at Medjugorje repeatedly

answered, when asked about her love for a particular people or

nation, that she is the Mother of all and loves all and wills the

salvation of all peoples. Christian patience must be like that--an

_expression of a love that is Godlike and Marylike.

We need patience just to survive--for people are people.

Some will be inconsiderate, some will be downright mean and selfish.

And we shall inevitably run into such people. Their meanness and

inconsideration could make us sad, depressed or discouraged. If we

let that happen, life for us will come to a standstill. ''Sorrow,"

said Paul, "brings death" (2 Corinthians 7:10). Sirach said it does

no good to yield to it (30:23). Shakespeare called sorrow the enemy

of life.

Patience, on the contrary, does not just endure hurts and

injuries; rather it embraces them with love and so sucks out the

venom in them. Instead of sorrow, there is joy--joy in knowing that

evil has been turned into good.

Without patience we will not survive in life. I remember

flying from Chicago to Kansas City one summer. It was the bumpiest

ride I ever had. The wings flapped like a seal before breakfast. I

thought the plane would fall apart. Later, I learned that elasticity

had been built into the wings on purpose. Had the wings been rigid

and inflexible, the sudden stresses and strains from wind and air

pockets would have snapped them.

On their drawing boards, engineers call this give and take

"tolerance." Tolerance is the amount of stress a wing can take

before it snaps.

What engineers build into the cold end of an aluminum wing,

we must build into our hearts. How many homes have been broken up,

because there is no tolerance---no give or take, no patience.

Aesop has a fable titled, "The Oak and the Reed." In a

mighty storm the proud Oak said, "I will not bend before the wind."

Then a sudden strong gust of wind came and uprooted the unbending

Oak. As the Oak lay prostrate on the ground, it saw a tiny reed

swaying in the storm. The Oak asked, "How is it that I who am so

mighty have been uprooted, whereas you who are so frail still stand

in the storm?'' The Reed answered, ''I give in a little to the

wind." How often just to give in, to say, "I'm sorry," has saved

many a relationship.

Patience is not weakness; it is not becoming a door mat. It

is an experience of such great love that it wins over people. No

person ever treated Abraham Lincoln with greater contempt than Edwin

Stanton. He called Lincoln a "low cunning clown." He nicknamed him

"the original gorilla." Lincoln said nothing. Instead, when he

needed a Secretary of War, Lincoln appointed Stanton, because he was

the best man for the job. He treated Stanton with every courtesy.

The years wore on. The night came when Lincoln was

assassinated. The body of the murdered President was taken to a

little room. That night, Stanton looked down on the face of Lincoln

in all its ruggedness; and, through tears, Stanton said: "There lies

the greatest ruler of men the world has ever seen." The patience of

love had conquered in the end.

It is only patience that will help people become better

than they are and make us better than we are.

Like the shaft of water hitting the turbines at Niagara

making them move, so love not striking back moves people toward God

and toward one another.

I do not want

The bravery of those

Who, gun in hand,

Rush forth to slay their foes.

>Not hatred, greed,

Or glory of conquest,

Would I find rooted

In my human breast.

But this, 0 God, I ask:

"Please make me strong

To offer love to those

Who do me wrong." (5-10)

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