Peace by Peace

‘If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.’

-Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta

Pope Benedict XVI, 2007 [Wikipedia]

‘Love of God and love of neighbour are thus inseparable, they form a single commandment. But both live from the love of God who has loved us first. No longer is it a question, then, of a “commandment” imposed from without and calling for the impossible, but rather of a freely-bestowed experience of love from within,  a love which by its very nature must then be shared with others. Love grows through love. Love is “divine” because it comes from God and unites us to God . . .’

–I Believe in One God: The Creed Explained, Benedict XVI

Pope Francis [Wikipedia]

‘Resentment is like a full house with lots of people crammed inside so they can't see the sky, while pain is like a city in which there are still lots of people, but at least you can see the sky. In other words, pain is open to prayer, tenderness, the company of a friend and thousands of things that offer dignity. That's why pain is a healthier situation than resentment.”

Pope Francis: Conversations with Jorge Bergoglio, Sergio Rubin and Francesca Ambrogetti, 2010.

Fishermen by Moonlight, HendrickAvercamp, 1620s
Rijkmuseum Amsterdam [Web Gallery of Art]

 

‘The environment is God’s gift to everyone, and in our use of it we have a responsibility towards the poor, towards future generations and towards humanity as a whole. . . The Church has a responsibility toward creation and she must assert this responsibility in the public sphere. In so doing, she must defend not only earth, water and air as gifts of creation that belong to everyone. She must above all protect mankind from self-destruction . . . Our duties towards the environment are linked to our duties towards the human person, considered in himself and in relation to others. It would be wrong to uphold one set of duties while trampling on the other.

–Pope Benedict XVI, On Integral Human Development in Charity and Truth (Caritas InVeritate), 2009, paragraphs 48 & 51. 

 

St Francis in Meditation, Caravaggio, c.1606
Galleria Nazionaled'ArteAntica, Rome [Web Gallery of Art]

‘Not to hurt our humble brethren is our first duty to them, but to stop there is not enough. We have a higher mission - to be of service to them wherever they require it.’

-Saint Francis of Assisi