Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira

So there you have grave, numerous and magnificent examples the New Testament gives us. Let us imitate them, therefore, as we imitate the adorable examples of sweetness, patience, kindness and meekness that our most clement Redeemer gave us.

To avoid any and all misunderstandings, once again we emphasize that this severe language should not become the only language of the apostle. On the contrary, we understand no apostolate is complete without the apostle being able to show the divine kindness of the Savior. But let us not be unilateral by ignoring, out of romanticism, convenience or lukewarmness, the lessons of admirable and invincible fortitude that Our Lord gave us. Like Him, let us strive to be equally humble and bold, peaceful and strong, meek and forceful, patient and severe. Let us not pick and choose among these virtues: perfection consists in imitating Our Lord in the plenitude of His adorable moral aspects.

For this end, we would now like to complete the thought expressed in an earlier chapter regarding the mentality of contemporary youth in the opinion of Cardinal Baudrillart, of happy memory: A thirst for heroism and sacrifice in today’s young men leads them to seek exclusively strong ideas and demanding programs and to despise everything that could mean sentimental concession or capitulation to lower urges that relentlessly call us to a life adrift in the senses. May God be praised for this disposition, which can greatly contribute to the salvation of souls. But just as we warned against one-sided and erroneous conceptions of the Lord’s mercy, we should remain alert to any exaggeration which, directly or indirectly, remotely or immediately might diminish in souls the notion of the central and most fundamental role that the law of kindness and love plays in the Religion of Jesus Christ Our Lord.

As a people, Brazilians have such a tendency to practice virtues that spring from kindness that their great danger is usually not found in lopsided tendencies toward cruelty and harshness but toward weakness, sentimentality and naiveté.

Exaggerations of virtue, because they are exaggerations, are defects that it behooves Catholic Action to fight and overcome. In this age of somber cruelty and implacable selfishness, it reflects well on our people that this should be the defect we must fight. Let us fight it, however, for sentimentality and ingenuousness lead to spiritual and moral ruins that theology describes with somber colors. Let us not dwell only in the tender contemplation of our kindness, but let us try to develop it supernaturally in the direction the Church indicates, without exaggeration, deviation or derailment. A comparison will clarify our thought.

Holy Mother Church says that Saint Teresa of Jesus "was admirable even in her errors." Nevertheless, had she lingered in the contemplation of golden sparks that existed in her errors and not fought them courageously, she would have never become the great Saint whom the whole of Christendom venerates and admires; the Saint Leibnitz said was "a great man." Brazil only will be the country we ardently desire it to be, that is, one of the greatest countries of all time, if it does not stop in the contemplation of the golden reflexes that exist in the dominant traits of its mentality but rather cleanses it of the residue that prevents this gold from shining with greater strength and purity.

All this notwithstanding, let us never forget that nothing in the Catholic Religion, absolutely nothing, is done without love; and that therefore, the severity imposed by the demands of charity must itself be exercised with eyes fixed on the same limits that surround both.

Let us close the subject with words from Pius XI. They show us that this irradiation of love is what shall save the world:

Our Predecessor of happy memory, Leo XIII, admiring the timely opportuneness of the devotion to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, said very aptly in his Encyclical Letter, "Annum Sacrum," "When in the days near her origin, the Church was oppressed under the yoke of the Caesars the Cross shown on high to the youthful Emperor was at once an omen and a cause of the victory that speedily followed. And here today another most auspicious and most divine sign is offered to our sight, to wit the most Sacred Heart of Jesus, with a Cross set above it shining with most resplendent brightness in the midst of flames. Herein must all hopes be set, from hence must the salvation of men be sought and expected." (143)

There is much talk about "New age," "new times," "new order." Whether or not our adversaries like it, this "new age" will be the reign of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, under whose most gracious influence the world will find the only way to salvation.

Let us adore this Sacred Heart, on which Catholic iconography shows us the Cross of sacrifice, struggle, combat, austerity, laying its roots in the most perfect of Hearts and illumined by purifying and dazzling flames of love.

Note:

143) Pius XI, Miserentissimus Redemptor, no. 2.

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