Letters of Catherine Benincasa

by Saint of Siena Catherine

In the Name of Jesus Christ crucified and of sweet Mary:

Dearest brother in Christ sweet Jesus: I Catherine, servant and slave of the servants of Jesus Christ, write to you in His precious Blood, with desire to see you constant and persevering in virtue; for it is not he who begins who is crowned, but only he who perseveres. For Perseverance is the Queen who is crowned; she stands between Fortitude and true Patience, but she alone receives a crown of glory. So I want you, dearest brother, to be constant and persevering in virtue, that you may receive the reward of your every labour. I hope in the great goodness of God that He will fortify you in such wise that neither demon nor fellow-creature can make you look back to your vomit.

You seem, according to what you write me, to have made a good beginning, in which I rejoice greatly for your salvation, seeing your holy desire. First, you say that you have forgiven every man who had wronged you or wished to wrong you. This is a thing which is very necessary, if you wish to have God in your soul through grace, and to be at rest even according to the world. For he who abides in hate is deprived of God and is in a state of condemnation, and has in this life the foretaste of hell; for he is always gnawing at himself, and hungers for vengeance, and abides in fear. Believing to slay his enemy, he has first killed himself, for he has slain his soul with the knife of hate. Such men as these, who think to slay their enemy, slay themselves. He who truly forgives through the love of Christ crucified, has peace and quiet, and suffers no perturbation; for the wrath that perturbs is slain in his soul, and God the Rewarder of every good gives him His grace and at the last eternal life. What joy the soul, then, receives, and gladness and rest in its conscience, the tongue could never tell. And even according to the world, very great honour is given to the man who through love of virtue and magnanimity does not greedily desire to wreak vengeance on his enemy. So I summon you and comfort you, to persevere in this holy resolution.

To demand and obtain your own in a reasonable way, this you can do with good conscience; whoever wants to can do it: for a man is not bound to abandon his possessions more than he chooses; but he who would choose to abandon them would reach a much greater perfection. It is well and excellent not to go to the Bishop's house nor to the palace, but to stay peaceably at home. For if other people get excited, we are weak, and often we find our own soul excited, and doing unjust and irrational things, one to show that he knows more than another, and one from appetite for money. Yes, it is better to keep away from the place.

But I add one thing: that when such poor men and women as are clearly in the right, and have no one to help them, show us the reason why they have no money, it would be greatly to the honour of God for you to undertake their cause, from the impulse of charity, like St. Ives, who in his time was the lawyer of the poor. Consider that the deed of pity, and ministering to the poor with those faculties which God has given you, is very pleasing to God, and salvation to your soul. Therefore St. Gregory says that it is impossible that a pitiful man should perish with an evil, that is, an eternal death. This, then, pleases me much, and I beg you to do it.

In all your works put God before your eyes, saying to yourself when intemperate appetite would lift its head against the resolution you have made: "Consider, my soul, that the eye of God is upon thee, and sees the secret of thy heart. Thou art mortal, for thou must die, and knowest not when; and it shall befit thee to render account before the highest Judge of what thou shalt do—a Judge who punishes every fault and rewards every good deed." In this wise, if you put on the bit it will not slip off, separating from the will of God.

You ought to give satisfaction to your soul as soon as you can, and unburden your conscience of what you feel it burdened with. Give it satisfaction, either for the trouble it has felt in giving up temporal possessions, or for the other annoyances that others have given it. And have pardon asked fully from everyone, in order that you may always remain in the joy of charity with your neighbour. As for selling the goods which you have over and above, and the showy garments (which are very harmful, dearest brother, and a means of penetrating the heart with vanity, and nourishing it with pride, since they make a man seem to be more and bigger than others, boasting of what one ought not to boast of; so it is great shame to us, false Christians, to see our Head tormented, and to abide ourselves in such luxuries: so St. Bernard says, that it is not fitting for limbs to be delicate beneath a thorn-crowned Head),—I say that you do very well to find a remedy for this. But clothe you as you need, modestly, at no immoderate price, and you will greatly please God. And, so far as you can, make your wife and your sons do the same; so that you may be to them example and teacher, as the father should be, who should educate his sons with the words and deeds of virtue.

I add one thing; that you abide in the state of marriage, with fear of God, and treat it with reverence as a sacrament, and not with intemperate desire. Hold in due reverence the days ordered by Holy Church, like a reasonable man, and not a brute beast. Then from yourself and her, like good trees, you will bring forth good fruits.

You will do very well to refuse offices; for a man seldom fails to give offence in them. It ought to weary you simply to hear them mentioned. Let the dead, then, bury themselves, and do you exert yourself, in liberty of heart, to please God, loving Him above everything in the desire of virtue, and your neighbour as yourself, fleeing the world and its delights. Renounce your sins and your own fleshly instincts, ever bringing back to memory the favours of God, and especially the favour of the Blood, shed for us with such fire of love.

Again, it is needful for you, if you wish your soul to preserve grace and grow in virtue, to make your holy confession often for your joy, that you may wash your soul's face in the Blood of Christ. At least once a month, since indeed we soil it every day. If more, more; but less it seems to me ought not to be done. And rejoice in hearing the Word of God. And when the season shall come that we are reconciled with our Father, do you communicate on the solemn Feasts, or at least once a year: rejoicing in the Office, and hearing Mass every day; and if you cannot every day, at least you must make an effort, just as far as you can, on the days which are ordered by Holy Church, to which we are bound.