Are you impatient with your own imperfections and those of others? Do you think you or some others in your family could stop being demanding around the home? Do you wish you or some others in the family could pitch in more ready when there is extra work to be done? Do you wish you or some others in your family were more excited about going to mass? Are you tired of being patient with a friend or family member who has a bad habit? What you would really like is for the other person to change.
Recently, a young mother told me that she is tired of trying to get her teenage son back to church. Although he attended mass with her when he was growing up, now that he has become a teenager, his attitude has changed. She thinks he is irreformable. The human tendency is to give up easily. We think we cannot change. And we think others cannot change. However, we learn from today’s Scripture that God who gathered Israel and us can and does make changes.
After years of patience with Israel who had forsaken Him and hardened their hearts (17:5), God compares Himself to a potter who molds and shapes clay into whatever he wants it to be. God tells Jeremiah, that for Him, people are like clay in a potter’s hand. He can and does break, mold and fashion them as He sees fit. But the people must repent and return to God. God gathers us into his Kingdom just as we are and, like a potter, He is constantly molding and refashioning into His best products.
In return, what are we to do? We pray that we stop being demanding around the home, We pray we pitch in more ready when there is extra work to be done, we pray we be more excited about going to mass, we pray we rectify our bad habits, and we pray we change ourselves before we try changing another person. And we exercise patience while praying.
God is patient with us. Are we ready to be patient with ourselves and others and pray as He molds and shapes us into His image of what we should be?
Father Pinto's inspirational homily was recorded live this morning during Mass at the Father Peyton Center. Please view the video on our Facebook page. (You don't need a Facebook account to view.)
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Father Pinto Paul C.S.C., ordained a priest in the Congregation of Holy Cross in 1999, worked with tribal populations in northeast India as a missionary for ten years. In 2010 he came to the US for further studies. While working as a campus minister at Stonehill College, he assisted pastors in local parishes, led seminars and workshops for teachers and students in the US and earned a master’s degree in Educational Administration from Boston College and a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership from Lesley University, Cambridge. He is currently working as the International Director of the Boston-based Holy Cross Family Ministries with missions in 18 countries.
.jpg "Father Pinto Paul, C.S.C.")