Letters of Catherine Benincasa by Catherine Benincasa

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Dearest mother,--in so far as you are a lover of truth and obedient to
Holy Church I call you mother, but in no otherwise, nor do I speak to you
with reverence, because I see a great change in your person. You who were
a lady have made yourself a servant, and slave of that which is not,
having submitted yourself to falsehood, and to the devil, who is its
father; abandoning the counsels of the Holy Spirit and accepting the
counsels of incarnate demons. You who were a branch of the true vine, have
cut yourself off from it with the knife of self-love. You who were a
legitimate daughter, tenderly beloved of her father, the Vicar of Christ
on earth, Pope Urban VI., who is really the Pope the highest pontiff, have
divided yourself from the bosom of your mother, Holy Church, where for so
long a time you have been nourished. Oh me! oh me! one can mourn over you
as over a dead woman, cast off from the life of grace; dead in soul and
dead in body, if you do not escape from such an error. It appears that you
have not known God's truth in the way I spoke of; for had you known it,
you would have chosen death rather than to offend God mortally. Nor have
you known truth about your neighbour; but in great ignorance, moved by
your own passion, you have followed the most miserable and insulting
counsel--having acted according to it--that I ever heard of. What greater
shame can be incurred than that one who was a Christian, held to be a
Catholic and virtuous woman, should act like a Christian who denies her
faith, and depart from good and holy customs and the due reverence she has
observed? Oh me! open the eye of your mind, and sleep no more in so great
misery. Do not await the moment of death--after which it will not help you
to make excuses, nor to say: "I thought to do good." For you know that you
do ill, but like a sick and passionate woman, you let yourself be guided
by your passions.

I am quite sure that the counsel came from someone beside yourself. Will,
will to know the truth; who those men are, and why they make you see
falsehood for truth, saying that Pope Urban VI. is not true Pope, and
making you consider that the antipope, who is simply an antichrist, member
of the devil, is Christ on earth. With what truth can they say that to
you? Not with any; but they say it with entire falsity, lying over their
heads. What can those iniquitous men say?--not men, but incarnate demons
--since, on whatever side they turn, they must see that they have done
nothing but ill. Even were it true--as it is not--that Pope Urban VI. was
not the Pope, they would merit a thousand deaths for this alone, as liars
discovered in their untruth; for had they chosen him through fear in the
beginning, and not honestly with a regular election, and had presented him
to us as a true Pope, see! they would have shown us a lie for truth,
making us, and themselves at the same time, obey and reverence him whom we
ought not. For they did do him reverence, and asked favours from him, and
profited by them, as if they came from the highest pontiff, as they did. I
say, that were it true that he was not the Pope--(which is not the case,
by the great goodness of God, who has had mercy upon us)--for this reason
alone they could not be too severely disciplined; but they deserve a
thousand thousand deaths to pretend that they elected the Pope through
fear, when it was not so. But they cannot speak the truth, being men
founded in falsehood, for they cannot so hide it that its darkness and
stench cannot be seen and felt. What they pretended is perfectly true:
they did elect a Pope through fear after they had elected the true Pope,
Messer Bartolomeo, Archbishop of Bari, who to-day is Pope Urban VI.: that
was, Messer di Santo Pietro. But he, like a good man and just, confessed
that he was not the Pope, but Messer Bartolomeo, Archbishop of Bari, who
to-day is called Pope Urban VI., and revered by faithful Christians as
highest pontiff and most just man, despite wicked men--not Christians, for
they bear the name of Christ neither on their lips nor on their heart--but
infidels who have deserted the faith and obedience of Holy Church and the
Vicar of Christ on earth, branches cut off from the True Vine, sowers of
schism and of greatest heresy.

Open, open the eye of your mind, and sleep no more in such blindness. You
should not be so ignorant nor so separated from the true light as not to
know the wicked life, with no fear of God, of those who have led you into
so great heresy: for the fruits which they bear show you what kinds of
trees they are. Their life shows you that they do not tell the truth; so
do the counsellors they have about them, without and within, who may be
men of knowledge, but they are not men of virtue, nor men whose life is
praiseworthy, but rather to be blamed for many faults. Where is the just
man whom they have chosen for antipope, if indeed our highest pontiff,
Pope Urban VI., were not the true Vicar of Christ? What man have they
chosen? A man of holy life? No, but an iniquitous man, a demon--and
therefore he does the works of demons. The devil exerts himself to
withdraw us from the truth, and he does the very same thing. Why did they
not choose a just man? Because they knew well enough that a just man would
have chosen death rather than to have accepted the papacy, since he would
have seen no colour of truth in them. Therefore the demons took the demon,
and the liars the lie. All these things show that Pope Urban VI. is truly
Pope, and that they are without truth, lovers of the lie.

If you said to me, "My mind is not clear as to all these things," why do
you not at least stay neutral? although it is as clear as can possibly be
said. And if you are not willing to help the Pope with your temporal
substance until you have more illumination--(help which you are in duty
bound to give, because the sons ought to help the father when he is in
need)--at least obey him in spiritual things, and in other things remain
neutral. But you are behaving like a passionate woman; and hate, and
spite, and the fear of losing him of whom you deprived yourself, which you
caught from a cursed teller of tales, has robbed us of light and
knowledge; for you do not know the truth, obstinately persevering in this
evil; and in this obstinacy you do not see the judgment which is coming
upon you.

Oh me! I say these words with heartfelt grief, because I tenderly love
your salvation. If you do not change your ways, and correct your life, by
abandoning this great error, and in regard to everything else, the highest
Judge, who does not let sins pass unpunished unless the soul purifies them
with contrition of heart and confession and satisfaction, will give you
such a punishment that you will become a signal instance to cause anyone
to tremble who should ever lift his head against the Holy Church. Wait not
for this rod; for it will be hard for you to kick against the divine
justice. You are to die, and know not when. Not riches, nor position,
however great, nor worldly dignity, nor barons, nor people who are your
subjects as to the body, shall be able to defend you before the highest
Judge, nor hinder the divine justice. But sometimes God works through
rascally men, in order that they may execute justice on His enemy. You
have invited and invite the people and all your subjects to be rather
against you than with you; for they have found little truth in your
character--not the quality of a man with virile heart, but that of a woman
without any firmness or stability, a woman who changes like a leaf in the
wind.

They have well in mind that when Pope Urban VI., true Pope, was created by
a great and true election, and crowned with great solemnity, you held a
great and high festival, as the child should do over the exaltation of the
father, and the mother over that of the son. For he was both son and
father to you; father, through his dignity to which he had come, son
because he was your subject--that is to say, of your kingdom. Therefore
you did well. Further, you commanded everyone to obey his Holiness as the
highest pontiff. Now I see that you have turned about, like a woman who
has no decision, and you will them to do the contrary. Oh, miserable
passion! That evil which you have in yourself you wish to impart to them.
How do you suppose that they can love you and be faithful to you, when
they see that you are responsible for separating them from life and
leading them into death, and casting them from truth into falsehood? You
separate them from Christ in heaven and from Christ on earth, and seek to
bind them to the devil, and to antichrist--lover and prophet of lies that
he is, he and you and the others who follow him.

No more thus for the love of Christ crucified! You are in every way
calling down the divine judgment. I grieve for it. If you do not hinder
the ruin that is coming upon you, you cannot escape from the hands of God.
Either by justice or by mercy, you are in His hands. Correct your life,
that you may escape the hands of justice, and remain in those of mercy.
And do not wait for the time, for an hour comes when you shall wish and
cannot. O sheep, return to your fold; let you be governed by the Shepherd:
else the wolf of hell shall devour you! Take back for your guards the
servants of God, who love you in truth more than you yourself, and good,
mature and discreet counsellors. For the counsel of incarnate demons, with
the inordinate fear into which they have thrown you through terror of
losing your temporal state--(which passes like the wind with no
permanence, for either it leaves us, or we it through death)--has brought
you where you are. You shall yet weep, if you change not your ways,
saying: "Alas, alas! I am one who has robbed herself, on account of the
fear into which I was thrown by villainous counsellors!" But there is yet
time, dearest mother, to avert the judgment of God. Return to the
obedience of Holy Church: know the ill that you have wrought: humble you
under the mighty hand of God; and God, who has regard to the humility of
His handmaid, shall show mercy upon us: He will placate His wrath over
your faults; through the mediation of the Blood of Christ, you shall be
grafted and bound in Him with the chain of that charity in which you shall
know and love the truth. The truth shall set you free from lie: it shall
scatter all shadows, giving you light and knowledge in the mercy of God.
In this truth you shall be freed; in other wise, never.

And because the truth sets us free, I, having desire for your salvation,
said that I desired to see you established in the truth, that it be not
wronged by falsehood. I beg you, fulfil in yourself the will of God and
the desire of my soul, for with all the depth and all the strength of my
soul I desire your salvation. And, therefore, constrained by the Divine
Goodness which loves you unspeakably, I have moved me to write to you with
great sorrow. Another time, also, I wrote you on this same matter. Have
patience if I burden you too much with words, and if I speak with you
boldly, irreverently. The love which I bear to you makes me speak with
boldness: the fault which you have committed makes me depart from due
reverence, and speak irreverently. I could wish far rather to tell you the
truth by speech than by writing, for your salvation, and chiefly for the
honour of God; and I would far rather deal in deeds than in words with him
who is to blame for it all, although the blame and the reason is in
yourself, since there is no one, neither demon nor creature, who can force
you to the least fault unless you choose. Therefore I said to you that you
are the cause of it. Bathe you in the Blood of Christ crucified. There are
scattered the clouds of self-love and servile fear, and the poison of hate
and self-scorn. I say no more to you. Remain in the holy and sweet grace
of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.

TO SISTER DANIELLA OF ORVIETO

Sister Daniella has found herself in straits again; constrained, it would
seem, by the Spirit, to action not endorsed by her religious superiors.
Possibly she wished, following the example of Catherine, to leave her
cloister and take part in the public life of her time. Catherine herself
had been in like straits during much of her early life. Well she knew, as
St. Francis knew before her, the suffering of that inward conflict, when
the Voice of God summons one way, and the voices of men, reinforced by
that instinct of humility and obedience which the middle ages held so
dear, insist upon another. She writes to her friend with comprehending
sympathy. Daniella, as we have already seen, was a woman who understood
her and whom she understood. And it must have been a relief to Catherine,
at this point in her career, for once to encourage ardour instead of
rebuking sin or seeking to inspire timidity. Our saint is so constantly on
the side of obedience, when, as not infrequently happens, some weak
brother or sister is restless under the yoke of vows, that we are sure she
must know her woman when she writes: "Fear and serve God, disregarding
yourself; and then do not care what people say unless it is to feel
compassion for them."

We see at the end of the letter that Catherine is on the point of going to
Rome. In fact, Urban had summoned her thither, being evidently alive to
the advantages of the support of one so famed for sanctity. In Rome the
remainder of her life was to be passed.

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 you in His precious Blood: with
desire to see thee in true and very perfect light, that thou mayest know
the truth in perfection. Oh, how necessary this light is to us, dearest
daughter! For without it we cannot walk in the Way of Christ crucified, a
shining Way that brings us to life; without it we shall walk among shadows
and abide in great storm and bitterness. But, if I consider aright, it
behoves us to possess two orders of this light. There is a general light,
that every rational creature ought to have, for recognizing whom he ought
to love and obey--perceiving in the light of his mind by the pupil of most
holy faith, that he is bound to love and serve his Creator, loving Him
directly, with all his heart and mind, and obeying the commandments of the
law to love God above everything, and our neighbour as ourselves. These
are the principles by which all men beside ourselves are held. This is a
general light, which we are all bound by; and without it we shall die, and
shall follow, deprived of the life of grace, the darkened way of the
devil. But there is another light, which is not apart from this, but one
with it--nay, by this first, one attains to the second. There are those
who, observing the commandments of God, grow into another most perfect
light; these rise from imperfection with great and holy desire, and attain
unto perfection, observing both commandments and counsels in thought and
deed. One should use this light with hungry desire for the honour of God
and the salvation of souls, gazing therewith into the light of the sweet
and loving Word, where the soul tastes the ineffable love which God has to
His creatures, shown to us through that Word, who ran as enamoured to the
shameful death of the Cross, for the honour of the Father and for our
salvation.

When the soul has known this truth in the perfect light, it rises above
itself, above its natural instincts; with intense, sweet and loving
desires, it runs, following the footsteps of Christ crucified, bearing
pains, bearing shame, ridicule and insult with much persecution, from the
world, and often from the servants of God under pretext of virtue.
Hungrily it seeks the honour of God and the salvation of souls; and so
much does it delight in this glorious food, that it despises itself and
everything else: this alone it seeks, and abandons itself. In this perfect
light lived the glorious virgins and the other saints, who delighted only
in receiving this food with their Bridegroom, on the table of the Cross.
Now to us, dearest daughter and sweet my sister in Christ sweet Jesus, He
has shown such grace and mercy that He has placed us in the number of
those who have advanced from the general light to the particular--that is,
He has made us choose the perfect state of the Counsels: therefore we
ought to follow that sweet and straight way perfectly, in true light, not
looking back for any reason whatever; not walking in our own fashion but
in the fashion of God, enduring sufferings without fault even unto death,
rescuing the soul from the hands of devils. For this is the Way and the
Rule that the Eternal Truth has given thee; and He wrote it on His body,
not with ink, but with His Blood, in letters so big that no one is of such
low intelligence as to be excused from reading. Well thou seest the
initials of that Book, how great they are; and all show the truth of the
Eternal Father, the ineffable love with which we were created--this is the
truth--only that we might share His highest and eternal good. This our
Master is lifted up on high upon the pulpit of the Cross, in order that we
may better study it, and should not deceive ourselves, saying: "He teaches
this to me on earth, and not on high." Not so: for He ascended upon the
Cross, and uplifted there in pain, He seeks to exalt the honour of the
Father, and to restore the beauty of souls. Then let us read heartfelt
love, founded in truth, in this Book of Life. Lose thyself wholly; and the
more thou shalt lose the more thou shalt find; and God will not despise
thy desire. Nay, He will direct thee, and show thee what thou shouldst do;
and will enlighten him to whom thou mightest be subject, if thou dost
according to His counsel. For the soul that prays ought to have a holy
jealousy, and let it always rejoice to do whatever it does with the help
of prayer and counsel.

Thou didst write me, and as I understood from thy letter it seems that
thou art troubled in heart. And this is not a slight feeling; nay, it is
mighty, stronger than any other, when on the one side thou dost feel
thyself called by God in new ways, and His servants put themselves on the
contrary side, saying that this is not well. I have a very great
compassion for thee; for I know not what burden is like that, from the
jealousy the soul has for itself; for it cannot offer resistance to God,
and it would also fulfil the will of His servants, trusting more in their
light and knowledge than in its own; and yet it does not seem able to. Now
I reply to thee simply according to my low and poor sight. Do not make up
thy mind obstinately, but as thou feelest thyself called without thine own
doing, so respond. So, if thou dost see souls in danger, and thou canst
help them, do not close thine eyes, but exert thyself with perfect zeal to
help them, even to death. And never mind about thy past resolutions to
silence or anything else--lest it be said to thee later: "Cursed be thou,
that thou wast silent." Our every principle and foundation is in the love
of God and our neighbour alone; all our other activities are instruments
and buildings placed on this foundation. Therefore thou shouldst not, for
pleasure in the instrument or the building, desert the principal
foundation in the honour of God and the love of our neighbour. Work, then,
my daughter, in that field where thou seest that God calls thee to work;
and do not get distressed or anxious in mind over what I have said to
thee, but endure manfully. Fear and serve God, with no regard to thyself;
and then do not care for what people may say, except to have compassion on
them.

As to the desire thou hast to leave thy house and go to Rome, throw it
upon the will of thy Bridegroom, and if it shall be for His honour and thy
salvation, He will send thee means and the way when thou art thinking
nothing about it, in a way that thou wouldst never have imagined. Let Him
alone, and lose thyself; and beware that thou lose thee nowhere but on the
Cross, and there thou shalt find thyself most perfectly. But this thou
couldst not do without the perfect light; and therefore I said to thee
that I desired to see thee in the true and most perfect light, beyond the
common light we talked of.

Let us sleep no more! Let us wake from the slumber of negligence, groaning
with humble continual prayers, over the mystical Body of Holy Church, and
over the Vicar of Christ! Cease not to pray for him, that Christ may give
him light and fortitude to resist the strokes of incarnate demons, lovers
of themselves, who seek to contaminate our faith. It is a time for
weeping.

As to my coming thy way, pray the highest eternal Goodness of God to do
what may be for His honour and the salvation of the soul, and pray
especially, for I am on the point of going to Rome, to fulfil the will of
Christ crucified and of His Vicar. I do not know what way I shall take.
Pray Christ sweet Jesus to send us by that way which is most to His
honour, in peace and quiet of our souls. I say no more to thee. Remain in
the holy and sweet grace of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.

TO STEFANO MACONI

"To Stefano di Corrado Maconi, her ignorant and most ungrateful son": "To
Stefano Maconi, her most ungrateful and unworthy son, when she was at
Rome": so run the superscriptions to these letters. Doubtless, they headed
copies made by the hand of Stefano himself. We have seen in connection
with Catherine's letters to his mother how constantly after their first
meeting this young disciple had been with her. Long before this, he had
become the best-beloved of the "Famiglia," and next to herself its most
important member. He did not, however, for some reason, accompany her to
Rome, and Catherine's heart yearned over him during the last weary months.
From the first, she had perceived in his frank and joyous temperament the
germs of high spiritual perfection, and had sought to draw him to the
monastic life. "Cut the bonds that hold thee, and do not merely loosen
them," she wrote in one of the first letters to Stefano that we possess:
"Resist no longer the Holy Spirit that is calling thee--for it will be
hard for thee to kick against Him. Do not let thyself be withheld by thine
own lukewarm heart, or by a womanish tenderness for thyself, but be a man,
and enter the battlefield manfully." Stefano, however, despite his
personal devotion to Catherine, felt for a long time no vocation for the
cloister. She continued, as we see in these letters, to urge him with
increasing insistence: but his hesitation was ended only by her death. He
hastened to Rome at the last, urgently summoned, in time to see her living
and to receive her last words. Her dying request did what her entreaties
during life had failed to do; the brilliant young noble became a
Carthusian monk. At a later time he was made General of the Order.
Devotion to the memory of Catherine was the inspiration of his life after
she left him.

The letters in this group were all written after Catherine had reached
Rome. They form a strong contrast to the more formal and elaborate
documents which she was at this time despatching to dignitaries,
concerning the ecclesiastical situation. Their serene spiritual fervour
bears witness to the "central peace" subsisting at the heart of the
"endless agitation" of her active life. In their intimate messages,
moreover, to home friends and disciples, they throw a charming light on
what may be called the domestic side of her character.

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

Dearest son 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 a true guardian of the city of thy soul. Oh, dearest son, this
city has many gates! They are three--Memory, Intellect, and Will, and our
Creator allows all of them to be battered, and sometimes opened by
violence, except one--that is, Will. So it happens at times that the
intellect sees nothing but shadows; the memory is occupied with vain and
transitory things, with many and varied reflections and impure thoughts;
and likewise all the sensations of the body are ill-regulated and
ravaging. So it is perfectly clear that no one of these gates is in our
own free possession, except only the Gate of Will. This belongs to our
liberties, and has for its Watch Free-will. And this gate is so strong
that nor demon nor creature can open it if the watch does not consent. And
while this gate is not open--that is, while it does not consent to what
Memory and Intellect and the other gates experience--our city keeps its
free privileges for ever. Let us, then, recognize, my son, let us
recognize so excellent a benefit and so unmeasured a largess of charity as
we have received from the Divine Goodness, that has put us in free
possession of so noble a city.

Let us strive to hold good and zealous watch, keeping at the side of our
Watch Free-will, the dog Conscience, who when anyone comes at the gate
must awake Reason by its barking, that she may discern whether it be
friend or foe: so that the watch may let friends enter, ordering good and
holy inspirations to do their work, and may drive away the foes, locking
the Gate of Will, that it consent not to admit the evil thoughts that come
to the gate every day. And when thy city shall be demanded of thee by the
Lord, thou canst give it up, sound, and adorned with true and royal
virtues, thanks to His grace. I say no more here.

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