Letters of Catherine Benincasa

by Saint of Siena Catherine

This is the doctrine which I remember has always been given you, although you have learned little of it. That which is not done, I beg you to do, dearest daughters. If you did not, you would abide in continual sufferings, and would drag poor me, who deserve every suffering, into them too.

We must do for the honour of God as the holy apostles did. When they had received the Holy Spirit, they separated from one another, and from that sweet mother Mary. Although it was their greatest delight to stay together, yet they gave up their own delight, and sought the honour of God and the salvation of souls. And although Mary sends them away from her, they do not therefore hold that love is diminished, or that they are deprived of the affection of Mary. This is the rule that we must take to ourselves. I know that my presence is a great consolation to you. Nevertheless, as truly obedient, you should not seek your own consolation, for the honour of God and the salvation of souls: and do not give place to the devil, who makes it look to you as if you were deprived of the love and devotion which I bear to your souls and bodies. Were it otherwise, true love would not be built on you. I assure you that I do not love you otherwise than in God. Why do you fall into such unregulated suffering over things which must necessarily be so? Oh, what shall we do when it shall befit us to do great deeds if we fail so in the little ones? We shall have to be together or separated according as things shall befall. Just now our sweet Saviour wills and permits that we be separated for His honour.

You are in Siena, and Cecca and Grandma are in Montepulciano. Frate Bartolomeo and Frate Matteo will be there and have been there. Alessa and Monna Bruna are at Monte Giove, eighteen miles from Montepulciano; they are with the Countess and Monna Lisa. Frate Raimondo and Frate Tommaso and Monna Tomma and Lisa and I are at Rocca among the Free-lances. And so many incarnate demons are being eaten up that Frate Tommaso says that his stomach aches over it! With all this they cannot be satisfied, and they are hungry for more, and find work here at a good price. Pray the Divine Goodness to give them big, sweet and bitter mouthfuls! Think that the honour of God and the salvation of souls is being sweetly seen. You ought not to want or desire anything else. You could do nothing more pleasing to the highest eternal will of God, and to mine, than feeling thus. Up, my daughters, begin to sacrifice your own wills to God! Don't be ready always to stay nurselings—for you should get the teeth of your desire ready to bite hard and musty bread, if needs be.

I say no more. Bind you in the sweet bands of love, so you will show that you are daughters—not otherwise. Comfort you in Christ sweet Jesus, and comfort all the other daughters. We will come back as soon as we can, according as it shall please the Divine Goodness. Remain in the holy and sweet grace of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.

TO MONNA ALESSA CLOTHED WITH THE HABIT OF SAINT DOMINIC, WHEN SHE WAS AT ROCCA

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

Dearest daughter in Christ sweet Jesus: I Catherine, servant and slave of the servants of Jesus Christ, write to thee in His precious Blood: with desire to see thee follow the doctrine of the Spotless Lamb with a free heart, divested of every creature-love, clothed only with the Creator, in the light of most holy faith. For without the light thou couldst not walk in the straight way of the Slain and Spotless Lamb. Therefore my soul desires to see thee and the others clean and virile, and not blown about by every wind that may befall. Beware of looking back, but go on steadily, holding in mind the teaching that has been given thee. Be sure to enter every day anew into the garden of thy soul with the light of faith to pull up every thorn that might smother the seed of the teaching given thee, and to turn over the earth; that is, every day do thou divest thy heart. It is necessary to divest it over and over; for many a time I have seen people who seemed to have divested themselves, whom I have found clothed in sin, by evidence rather of deed than of words. The opposite might appear by their words, but deeds showed their affections. I want, then, that thou shouldst divest thy heart in truth, following Christ crucified. And let silence abide on thy lips. I have taken note; for I believe that the other woman holds to it very little. I am very sorry for that. If it is so, as it seems to me, my Creator wills that I should bear it, and I am content to do so: but I am not content with the wrong done to God.

Thou didst write me that God seemed to constrain thee in thy orisons to pray for me. Thanks be to the Divine Goodness, who shows such unspeakable love to my poor soul! Thou didst tell me to write thee if I were suffering and had my usual infirmities at this time. I reply that God has cared for me marvellously, within and without. He has cared very much for my body this Advent, causing the pains to be diverted by writing; it is true that, by the goodness of God, they have been worse than they used to be. If He made them worse, He saw to it that Lisa was cured as soon as Frate Santi fell ill—for he has been at the point of death. Now, almost miraculously, he has grown so much better that he can be called cured. But apparently my Bridegroom, Eternal Truth, has wished to put me to a very sweet and genuine test, inward and outward, in the things which are seen and those which are not—the latter beyond count the greater. But while He was testing us, He has cared for us so gently as tongue could not tell. Therefore I wish pains to be food to me, tears my drink, sweat my ointment. Let pains make me fat, let pains cure me, let pains give me light, let pains give me wisdom, let pains clothe my nakedness, let pains strip me of all self-love, spiritual and temporal. The pain of lacking consolations from my fellow-creatures has called me to consider my own lack of virtue, recognizing my imperfection, and the very perfect light of Sweet Truth, who gives and receives, not material things, but holy desires: Him who has not withdrawn His goodness toward me for my little light or knowledge, but has had regard only to Himself, the One supremely Good.

I beg thee by the love of Jesus Christ crucified, dearest my daughter, do not slacken in prayer: nay, redouble it—for I have greater need thereof than thou seest—and do thou thank the Goodness of God for me. And pray Him to give me grace that I may give my life for Him, and to take away, if so please Him, the burden of my body. For my life is of very little use to anyone else; rather is it painful and oppressive to every person, far and near, by reason of my sins. May God by His mercy take from me such great faults, and for the little time that I have to live, may He make me live impassioned by the love of virtue! And may I in pain offer before Him my dolorous and suffering desires for the salvation of all the world and the reformation of Holy Church! Joy, joy in the Cross with me! So may the Cross be a bed where the soul may rest: a table where may be tasted heavenly food, the fruit of patience with quietness and assurance.

Thou didst send to me saying … I was consoled by this thing, both by her life, hoping that she is correcting herself and living with less vanity of heart than she has done till now, and also by the children's having been brought to the light of Holy Baptism. May God give them His sweetest grace, and grant them death if they are not to be good! Bless them, and comfort her, in Christ sweet Jesus: and tell her to live in the holy and sweet fear of God, and to recognize the grace she has received from God, which has not been small but very great. Were she to be ungrateful, it would much displease God, and perhaps He would not leave her unpunished.