Saints are people too
The late Dorothy Day, a 20th-century Catholic, is someone many people hope will be named a saint. Her life of service to the poor and homeless in New York City won her worldwide respect. She often spoke about the glory and the drudgery of motherhood.
“What mother ever considers the ugliness of cleaning up after her baby or sick child?” she said. Saints are like mothers, she said; saints see the world through the eyes of faith. They have the same perspective of a loving mother. She said, “To the saints everyone is child and lover. Everyone is Christ.”
A lot of people scoff at the idea of miracles, but saints see miracles occurring every day. Even the great Albert Einstein saw this truth when he wrote, “There are two ways to live your life; one is as though nothing is a miracle, the other is as though everything is a miracle.”
Saints have no problem seeing the hidden hand of God in miraculous events. For instance, at Lourdes, France, the shrine where Our Lady appeared to St. Bernadette more than 150 years ago, thousands of little miracles take place every year.
Recently, a little girl with Down syndrome named Riley needed a kidney operation. X-rays showed that she also had a hole in her heart. Her family took her to Lourdes hoping for a cure. When they returned, the doctor checked her heart and found it no longer had a hole in it. Her kidney problem had also disappeared.
Riley still has Down syndrome, but today she is a lovely young lady enjoying life. This story will never be recorded as a miracle, but to her saintly family it certainly was.
Saints are subject to faults and failings like everyone else. Many of them suffered from fits of anger. St. Teresa of Avila probably never realized that her hot temper could have been caused by dehydration.
She once wrote, “The devil sends me so offensive a bad spirit of temper that at times I think I could fly into a rage.”
Maybe all she needed was a tall glass of water. Maybe we all should be more patient with ourselves when we fly off the handle.
Did you know that irritability is the first sign of dehydration?
People get angry when their body is thirsty. We’re told that if you do not drink at least two quarts of water a day, chances are you might be dehydrated, too.
Speaking of anger, the great St. Thomas Aquinas had this to say, “There is no sin in having righteous wrath, provided there is no undue desire for revenge.”
He meant that as long as you don’t plot the downfall of your tormentor, there is no malice in anger; in fact it might be fully justified.
Jesus was often angry, and for good reason.
I wonder how angry St. Francis of Assisi became when people turned on him for preaching against the culture of greed and materialism. He recommended voluntary poverty as a remedy and an antidote to the avaricious spirit.
In a materialistic age such as ours, I wonder how he would be received today if he told people they should deny themselves the things that everyone believes they must have.
Try telling young people that as a sign of their devotion to the Gospel, they should give up the latest cell phone.
Parents and youngsters need to be more conscious of the call to holiness.
Jesus said, “Deny yourself, and take up your cross.”