Letters of Catherine Benincasa by Catherine Benincasa

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I say no more. Be as urgent as you can, now that the Holy Father is to be
at Rome. I have done, and shall do, what I can, until death, for the
honour of God and for your peace, in order that this obstacle may be
removed, for it hinders the holy and sweet Crusade. If no other ill should
come from it, we are worthy of a thousand hells. Comfort you in Christ our
sweet Jesus, for I hope by His goodness that if you will keep in the way
you should you will have a good peace. Remain in the holy and sweet grace
of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.

TO GREGORY XI

The attempt to reconcile Gregory with the Florentines miscarried through
their own fault. Catherine, far from being daunted by mortification or
failure, bent herself with new energy to the cause which she had even more
deeply at heart--the return of the Pope to Rome. The ascendency which she
obtained over his sensitive spirit was soon evident to everyone, and no
sooner was it realized than counter influences were set to work. Other
people beside this woman of Siena could write letters, and, since Gregory
proved superstitious and susceptible to the influence of holy fools, why,
there were ecstatics enough in Europe! The Pope, as is obvious from this
reply of Catherine's, had received an anonymous epistle, craftily wrought,
purporting to come from a man of God, working on his well-known love for
his family and timidity of nature, warning him of poison should he venture
to return to Rome. Whether Catherine's surmise that the letter was a
forgery proceeding from the papal court was justified we do not know; the
episode is of interest to us now chiefly because it called forth a reply
which shows how sardonic the meek of the earth can be. Catherine's
trenchant exposure of the weakness of the anonymous correspondent shows
her in a new aspect. Terrible is the scorn of the gentle. "He who wrote it
does not seem to me to understand his trade very well; he ought to put
himself to school," writes she, and proceeds with analysis so convincing
and exhortation so invigorating that even the vacillating Gregory must
have been magnetized afresh with power to resolve. One feels in the letter
that Catherine is as near impatience with him and with the situation as is
permitted to a saint. Gregory must have felt the sting in her words when
she tells him plainly that his correspondent treats him like a coward or a
frightened child, and adds on her own part, "I pray you on behalf of
Christ crucified that you be no longer a timorous child, but manly. Open
your mouth, and swallow down the bitter for the sake of the sweet." If
anyone could hold a weak nature true to its better self, it would be this
woman, endued as she was with a vitality that tingles through her words
down the centuries.

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

Most holy and reverend sweet father in Christ sweet Jesus: your poor
unworthy daughter Catherine, servant and slave of the servants of Jesus
Christ, writes to your Holiness in His precious Blood, with desire to see
you so strong and persevering in your holy resolve that no contrary wind
can hinder you, neither devil nor creature. For it seems that your enemies
are disposed to come, as Our Saviour says in His holy gospel, in sheeps'
raiment, looking like lambs, while they are ravening wolves. Our Saviour
says that we should be on our guard against such. Apparently, sweet
father, they are beginning to approach you in writing; and beside writing,
they announce to you the coming of the author, saying that he will arrive
at your door when you know it not. The man sounds humble when he says, "If
it is open to me, I will enter and we will reason together"; but he puts
on the garment of humility only that he may be believed. And the virtue in
which pride cloaks itself is really boastful.

So far as I have understood, this person has treated your Holiness in this
letter as the devil treats the soul, who often, under colour of virtue and
compassion, injects poison into it. And he uses this device especially
with the servants of God, because he sees that he could not deceive them
with open sin alone. So it seems to me that this incarnate demon is doing
who has written you under colour of compassion and in holy style, for the
letter purports to come from a holy and just man, and it does come from
wicked men, counsellors of the devil, who cripple the common good of the
Christian congregation and the reform of Holy Church, self-lovers, who
seek only their own private good. But you can soon discover, father,
whether it came from that just man or not. And it seems to me that, for
the honour of God, you must investigate.

So far as I can understand, I do not think the man a servant of God, and
his language does not so present him--but the letter seems to me a
forgery. Nor does he who wrote it understand his trade very well. He ought
to put himself to school--he seems to have known less than a small child.

Notice, now, most Holy Father: he has made his first appeal to the
tendency that he knows to be the chief frailty in man, and especially in
those who are very tender and pitiful in their natural affections, and
tender to their own bodies--for such men as these hold life dearer than
any others. So he fastened on this point from his first word. But I hope,
by the goodness of God, that you will pay more heed to His honour and the
safety of your own flock than to yourself, like a good shepherd, who ought
to lay down his life for his sheep.

Next, this poisonous man seems on the one hand to commend your return to
Rome, calling it a good and holy thing; but, on the other hand, he says
that poison is prepared for you there; and he seems to advise you to send
trustworthy men to precede you, who will find the poison on the tables--
that is, apparently, in bottles, ready to be administered by degrees,
either by the day, or the month, or the year. Now I quite agree with him
that poison can be found--for that matter, as well on the tables of
Avignon or other cities as on those of Rome: and prepared for
administration slowly, by the month, or the year, or in large quantities,
as may please the purchaser: it can be found everywhere. So he would think
it well for you to send, and delay your return for this purpose he
proposes that you wait till divine judgment fall by this means on those
wicked men who, it would seem, according to what he says, are seeking your
death. But were he wise, he would expect that judgment to fall on himself,
for he is sowing the worst poison that has been sown for a long time in
Holy Church, inasmuch as he wants to hinder you from following God's call
and doing your duty. Do you know how that poison would be sown? If you did
not go, but sent, as the good man advises you, scandal and rebellion,
spiritual and temporal, would be stirred up--men finding a lie in you, who
hold the Seat of Truth. For since you have decided on your return and
announced it, the scandal and bewilderment and disturbance in men's hearts
would be too great if they found that it did not happen. Assuredly he says
the truth: he is as prophetic as Caiphas when he said: "It is necessary
for one man to die that the people perish not." He did not know what he
was saying, but the Holy Spirit, who spoke the truth by his mouth, knew
very well--though the devil did not make him speak with this intention. So
this man is likely to be another Caiphas. He prophesies that if you send,
men will find poison. Truly so it is; for were your sins so great that you
stayed and they went, your confidants will find poison bottled in their
hearts and mouths, as was said. And not only enough for one day, but it
would last the month and the year before it was digested. Much I marvel at
the words of this man, who commends an act as good and holy and religious,
and then wants this holy act to be given up from bodily fear! It is not
the habit of the servants of God ever to be willing to give up a spiritual
act or work on account of bodily or temporal harm, even should life itself
be spent: for had they done thus, none of them would have reached his
goal. For the perseverance of holy and good desire into good works, is the
thing which is crowned, and which merits glory and not confusion.

Therefore I said to you, Reverend Father, that I desired to see you firm
and stable in your good resolution (since on this will follow the
pacification of your rebellious sons and the reform of Holy Church) and
also to see you fulfil the desire felt by the servants of God, to behold
you raise the standard of the most holy Cross against the infidels. Then
can you minister the Blood of the Lamb to those wretched infidels: for you
are cupbearer of that Blood, and hold the keys of it.

Alas, father, I beg you, by the love of Christ crucified, that you turn
your power to this swiftly, since without your power it cannot be done.
Yet I do not advise you, sweet father, to abandon those who are your
natural sons, who feed at the breasts of the Bride of Christ, for bastard
sons who are not yet made lawful by holy baptism. But I hope, by the
goodness of God, that if your legitimate sons walk with your authority,
and with the divine power of the sword of holy Writ, and with human force
and virtue, these others will turn to Holy Church the Mother, and you will
legalize them. It seems as if this would be honour to God, profit to
yourself, honour and exaltation to the sweet Bride of Christ Jesus, rather
than to follow the foolish advice of this just man, who propounds that it
would be better for you and for other ministers of the Church of God to
live among faithless Saracens than among the people of Rome and Italy.

I am pleased by the commendable hunger that he has for the salvation of
the infidels, but I am not pleased that he wishes to take the father from
his lawful sons, and the shepherd from the sheep gathered in the fold. I
think he wants to treat you as the mother treats the child when she wants
to wean him: she puts something bitter on her bosom, that he may taste the
bitterness before the milk, so that he may abandon the sweet through fear
of the bitter; because a child is more easily deluded by bitterness than
by anything else. So this man wants to do to you, suggesting to you the
bitterness of poison and of great persecution, to delude the childishness
of your weak sensuous love, that you may leave the milk through fear: the
milk of grace, which follows on your sweet return. And I beg of you, on
behalf of Christ crucified, that you be not a timorous child, but manly.
Open your mouth, and swallow down the bitter for the sweet. It would not
befit your holiness to abandon the milk for the bitterness. I hope by the
infinite and inestimable goodness of God, that if you choose He will show
favour to both us and to you; and that you will be a firm and stable man,
unmoved by any wind or illusion of the devil, or counsel of devil
incarnate, but following the will of God and your good desire, and the
counsel of the servants of Jesus Christ crucified.

I say no more. I conclude that the letter sent to you does not come from
that servant of God named to you, and that it was not written very far
away; but I believe that it comes from very near, and from the servants of
the devil, who have little fear of God. For in so far as I might believe
that it came from that man, I should not hold him a servant of God unless
I saw some other proof. Pardon me, father, my over-presumptuous speech.
Humbly I ask you to pardon me and give me your benediction. Remain in the
holy and sweet grace of God. I pray His infinite Goodness to grant me the
favour soon, for His honour, to see you put your feet beyond the threshold
in peace, repose, and quiet of soul and body. I beg you, sweet father, to
grant me audience when it shall please your Holiness, for I would find
myself in your presence before I depart. The time is short: therefore,
wherever it may please you, I wish that it might be soon. Sweet Jesus,
Jesus Love.

TO MONNA LAPA HER MOTHER
BEFORE SHE RETURNED FROM AVIGNON

Catherine succeeded in her great aim. In September, 1376, Gregory actually
started for Rome. Her mission being ended, Catherine set forth on her
homeward journey on the same day as the Pope, though by a different route.
But her progress was interrupted at Genoa, where, owing to illness among
her companions, she was detained for a month in the house of Madonna
Orietta Scotta. Her prolonged absence seems to have been too much for the
patience of Monna Lapa, who was always unable to understand in the least
the actions of her puzzling though beloved child. Catherine, though lifted
into the region of great anxieties and great triumphs, was yet always
tenderly mindful of the claims of home. Very daughterly, very gently wise,
is this little letter to the lonely and fretful mother, written when the
saint had just passed through those exciting and decisive months at the
Papal court.

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

Dearest mother in Christ sweet Jesus: Your poor, unworthy daughter
Catherine comforts you in the precious Blood of the Son of God. With
desire have I desired to see you a true mother, not only of my body but of
my soul; for I have reflected that if you are more the lover of my soul
than of my body, all disordinate tenderness will die in you, and it will
not be such a burden to you to long for my bodily presence; but it will
rather be a consolation to you, and you will wish, for the honour of God,
to endure every burden for me, provided that the honour of God be wrought.
Working for the honour of God, I am not without the increase of grace and
power in my soul. Yes, indeed, it is true that if you, sweetest mother,
love my soul better than my body, you will be consoled and not
disconsolate. I want you to learn from that sweet mother, Mary, who, for
the honour of God and for our salvation, gave us her Son, dead upon the
wood of the most holy Cross. And when Mary was left alone, after Christ
had ascended into Heaven, she stayed with the holy disciples; and although
Mary and the disciples had great consolation together, and to separate was
sorrow, nevertheless, for the glory and praise of her Son, for the good of
the whole universal world, she consented and chose that they should go
away. And she chose the burden of their departure rather than the
consolation of their remaining, solely through the love that she had for
the honour of God and for our salvation. Now, I want you to learn from
her, dearest mother. You know that it behoves me to follow the will of
God; and I know that you wish me to follow it. His will was that I should
go away; which going did not happen without mystery, nor without fruit of
great value. It was His will that I should come, and not the will of man;
and whoever might say the opposite, it is not the truth. And thus it will
behove me to go on, following His footsteps in what way and at what time
shall please His inestimable goodness. You, like a good, sweet mother,
must be content, and not disconsolate, enduring every burden for the
honour of God, and for your and my salvation. Remember that you did this
for the sake of temporal goods, when your sons left you to gain temporal
wealth; now, to gain eternal life, it seems to you such an affliction that
you say that you will go and run away if I do not reply to you soon. All
this happens to you because you love better that part which I derived from
you--that is, your flesh, with which you clothed me--than what I have
derived from God. Lift up, lift up your heart and mind a little to that
sweet and holiest Cross where all affliction ceases; be willing to bear a
little finite pain, to escape the infinite pain which we merit for our
sins. Now, comfort you, for the love of Christ crucified, and do not think
that you are abandoned either by God or by me. Yet shall you be comforted,
and receive full consolation; and the pain has not been so great that the
joy shall not be greater. We shall come soon, by the mercy of God; and we
should not have delayed our coming now, were it not for the obstacle we
have had in the serious illness of Neri. Also Master Giovanni and Fra
Bartolommeo have been ill.... I say no more. Commend us.... Remain in the
holy and sweet grace of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love!

TO MONNA GIOVANNA DI CORRADO MACONI

Monna Lapa was evidently not the only mother in Siena who fretted over the
long absence from home of Catherine and her spiritual children. Monna
Giovanna, of the noble family of the Maconi, longed for the presence of
Catherine's secretary, her beloved son Stefano. This is the second letter
which Catherine wrote in the effort to reconcile her. We cannot be
surprised if she murmured. Stefano had known Catherine for a few months
only when she bore him off with her to Avignon. Their relations dated from
January, 1376, when at his entreaty she healed a feud of long standing
between the Maconi and the rival house of the Tolomei. From this time he
attached himself to her person, and his devotion to her made him an object
of ridicule to his bewildered former friends. He was, by all accounts, a
singularly attractive and lovable young man--sunny, light-hearted, and
popular wherever he went. Catherine from the first loved him, as she avows
in this letter, with especial tenderness. She made him her trusted
intimate, and from now until shortly before her death he was in almost
constant attendance upon her, or when away was still occupied in her
affairs. Catherine was evidently on intimate and affectionate terms with
the rest of the Maconi family also; but it is not strange if Monna
Giovanna developed a little motherly jealousy, as she saw her brilliant
son not only absorbed by this new friendship, but borne away to distant
lands. Catherine's letter is as applicable to-day as then, to all parents
whose misguided tenderness would seek to hinder their children in a high
vocation.

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

To you, dearest sister and daughter in Christ Jesus: I Catherine, servant
and slave of the servants of Jesus Christ, write in His precious Blood,
with desire to see you clothed in the wedding garment. For I consider that
without this garment the soul cannot please its Creator, nor take its
place at the Marriage Feast in the enduring life. I wish you, therefore,
to be clothed in it; and in order that you may clothe you the better, I
wish you to divest yourself of all self-love according to nature and the
senses, which you feel for yourself, your children, and any other created
thing. You ought to love neither yourself nor anything else apart from
God; for it is impossible that a man can serve two masters; if he serve
the one, he does not give satisfaction to the other. And there is no one
who can serve both God and the world, for they have no harmony with each
other. The world seeks honour, rank, wealth, sons in high place, good
birth, sensuous pleasure and indulgence, all rooted in perverted pride;
but God seeks and wants exactly the opposite. He wants voluntary poverty,
a humbled heart, disparagement of self and of every worldly joy and grace;
that personal honour be not sought, but the honour of God and the
salvation of one's neighbour. Let a man seek only in what way he may
clothe him in the fire of most ardent charity with the ornament of sweet
and sincere virtue, with true and holy patience; let him take no revenge
on another for any injury his neighbour may show him, but endure all in
patience, seeking only to pass sentence on himself, because he sees that
he has wronged the Sweet Primal Truth. And what he loves, let him love in
God, and apart from God love nothing.

And did you say to me, "In what way should I love?" I answer you that
children and everything else should be loved for love of Him who created
them, and not for love of one's self or the children; and that God should
never be wronged for their sake or any other. That is, do not love through
regard to any utility, nor as your own thing, but as a thing lent to you:
since whatever is given us in this life is given for use, as a loan, and
is left to us so long only as pleases the Divine Goodness which gave it
us. You should use everything, then, as a steward of Christ crucified,
spending your temporal substance so far as is possible to you for the
poor, who stand in the place of God; and so you ought to spend your
children, nourishing and educating them ever in the fear of God, and
wishing that they should die rather than wrong their Creator. Oh, make a
sacrifice of yourself and them to God! And if you see that God is calling
them, offer no resistance to His sweet will: but if they welcome it with
one hand, do you reach out both like a true loving mother, who loves their
salvation; do not desire to shape their lives to suit yourself--for this
would be a sign that you loved them apart from God--but with any state to
which God calls them, with that be you content. For a mother who loves her
children according to the wickedness of the world, says many a time: "It
pleases me well that my children should please God; they can serve Him in
the world as well as anywhere else." But it happens often to these simple
mothers, who want to plunge their children in the world, that later they
possess those children neither in the world nor in God. And it is a just
thing that they should be deprived of them, spirit and body, since such
ignorance and pride reigns in them that they want to lay down law and rule
to the Holy Spirit, who is calling them. Such people do not love their
children in God, but with sensuous self-love apart from God, for they love
their bodies more than their souls. Never, dearest sister and daughter in
Christ sweet Jesus, could he clothe himself in Christ crucified who had
not first divested him of this. I hope by the goodness of God that all
this will not apply to you, but that you will give yourself and them to
the honour and glory of the Name of God, like a true good mother, and so
shall you be clothed in the Wedding Garment. But in order that you may
clothe you the better, I want that you should lift your desire and heart
above the world and all its doings, and that you should open the eye of
the mind to know what love God bears to you, who has given you, for love,
the Word, His Only-Begotten Son; and the Son in burning love has given you
life, and has sacrificed His Body that He might cleanse us with His Blood.
Ignorant are we and wretched who nor know nor love so great a benefit! But
all this is because our eyes are closed; for were they open, and had they
fastened themselves on Christ crucified, they would not be ignorant nor
ungrateful in presence of so great grace. Therefore I say to you, keep
your eyes ever open, and fasten them fixedly on the Lamb that was slain,
in order that you may never fall into ignorance.

Up, sweetest daughter, let us delay no more! Let us recover the time we
have lost, with true and perfect love; so that, clothing ourselves in this
life with the garment I spoke of, we may joy and exult at the Marriage
Feast in the enduring life--you and your husband and your children
together. And comfort you sweetly, and be patient, and do not grow
disturbed because I have kept Stefano so long: for I have taken good care
of him, for by love and tenderness I have become one thing with him,
therefore I have treated your things as if they were my own. I think you
have not taken this in bad part. I wish to do whatever I can for him and
for you, even to death. You, mother, bore him once; and I wish to bear him
and you and all your family, in tears and sweats, by continual prayers and
desire for your salvation.

I say no more. Commend me to Currado, and bless all the rest of the
family, and especially my little new plant, that has just been planted
anew in the Garden of Holy Church. Be it commended to you, and do you
bring it up for me virtuously, so that it may shed fragrance among the
other flowers. God fill you with His most sweet favour. Remain in the holy
and sweet grace of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.

TO MESSER RISTORO CANIGIANI

Apart from her relations with Religious seeking to follow the Counsels,
Catherine directed the life of a number of devout laymen. Among these was
Ristoro Canigiani, an honourable citizen of Florence, whose younger
brother, Barduccio, became one of her secretaries, and was with her at her
death. In the first letter to Ristoro here given, we see that he had
already become Catherine's disciple. He had evinced his sincerity by
forgiving his enemies--a feat more practical and difficult for most men in
those days than now--by withdrawing in a measure from society--
(ecclesiastical, one notes, as well as secular)--and by embracing the
simple life, selling his superfluous possessions. In the second letter
given, he has evidently advanced in experience. Like many religious souls
since his day, he suffers from scruples lest he be unworthy to receive the
Holy Communion. Catherine handles his difficulties tenderly and wisely, in
words which all anxious souls would do well to take to heart. She has no
reproofs for this excellent man, only applause and encouragement. It is
noteworthy that neither in these letters nor in any others does she seek
to induct Ristoro into that region of ecstatic mystery where she herself
lived, and whither she was wont to expect--often in vain--certain of her
friends to follow her. The standard which she sets for this devout layman
could not be better summed up than in the familiar words: "A sober, godly,
and righteous life."

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