Margaret Anna Fridays

Every Friday, I’m going to share a quote from the founder of my groovy sisters, Margaret Anna Cusack, known in religion as Mother Francis Clare. This week’s installment …

Let us then learn, from the example of Jesus, how to order our words aright. The Catholic owes an especial duty to the world in this, for the world cannot understand patience under injury, silence under calumny, or gentle and courteous language to one who has done so deadly injustice. Yet these are the lessons which Jesus came to teach us, and the lessons of which He gave us Himself the example, “Friend, whereto art thou come?” It is not so long since a Christian, though not a Catholic, in a high place commented most severely on an ecclesiastic who had addressed kind and even respectful language to a contumacious member of his fold. He did not understand this practical Christianity, and so he condemned it. And we need not expect the world to understand it; but let us not forget that our Master expects us to practise it, and that He has told us again and yet again that we are not to live, or think, or act, or speak like the world. - Margaret Anna Cusack, The Book of the Blessed Ones