…Continued from page 2
Why do we write about cooperatives, credit unions, mutual aid? Because when we see what Christianity
is, when we see the beauty of our faith–when we have gone through something analogous to a
conversion, we see all things new, as St. Paul says. We look upon our work, our lives, and we say, “How
do these things square with Christian teaching? Can we go on making money at the expense of our
brother? Can we be profiteers, can we work on Wall Street? Can we go in for advertising which sets up
false standards, which perverts the people, which fills their minds with meretricious desires, making the
good sweet life of the Christian unpalatable?” If we wish to follow Christ, we will be workers like Jesus,
like St. Joseph, like St. Paul. We will think of the dignity of labor, we will respect the worker, will bear our
share of responsibility toward making that new social order wherein justice dwelt, where people will have
that certain amount of goods which St. Thomas says is necessary to lead a good life.!
!
Why do we talk about houses of hospitality, bread lines, and farming communes and the necessity of
taking care of our poorer brother? Because the greatest hypocrisy is this, to say to our brother in need,
“Go, be now filled,” and give him no bread.!
!
How can we show our love for God except through our love for our brothers?!
How can we cease to cry out against injustice and human misery?!
!
The first Sunday in May, I went visiting through Paterson and Passaic with Sr. Peter Claver, and saw
some of her Negro students and heard some of their stories. There was one elderly woman caring for
grandchildren, two little boys, working at hard days’ work, living in a cold house. During the depths of the
winter she had no stove. At one time she was so poor she sold her bed and slept on a board between
two chairs.!
!
There is always work, people will say. Yes, but what if your children are sick, or if you are too ill yourself
to work?!
!
This poor woman had supplied the bouquet of flowers that Low Sunday morning for the altar of the little
Negro Chapel in Paterson. They were the only flowers there, and it was the month of May.!
!
She had one of her grandchildren in her arms all during the mass and it cooed like a little pigeon.!
!
Oh, the suffering, the poverty, of these poor of Christ, and the indifference of Christians!!
!
On my recent visit South I heard of a white man who had killed seven Negroes, one for not getting out of
his bed, one for marrying a mulatto of whom he was enamored. And in speaking of these things to one of
the brothers of the order I had visited he said to me:!
!
“But that is not the worst. When I was down south as a brother, I saw a young man with his arms and
legs grotesquely crippled. He had offended a white man at the age of 12 or so and the man had laid hold
of him and a broken both his arms and legs like matchsticks. They were never set properly and he was
crippled for life.”!
!
Are not these sins crying to heaven for vengeance? And how can we do anything but howl over the sins
in which we share? They are our sins. Just as we believe in the communion of saints–that we share in
the merits of the saints, so we must believe that we share in the guilt of such cruelty and injustice.!
!
We cannot talk of the love of God, the love of our neighbor without recognizing the dire need for
penance. In a world in which such cruelty exists, in which men are so possessed, such a spirit cannot be
cast out but by prayer and fasting. Our Lord Himself said so.