Putting On the Virtue of Gentleness
December 21, 2022

Aquinas reminds us that the passion most immediately associated with justice is anger.¹ Anger recoils in the face of injustice in order to spring back and wipe it out. It moves us to lunge toward justice, to hunger and thirst for it. Anger springs from love and respect for the human person, whose rights we perceive as being violated. It strains to right wrong, to reestablish an order in which persons can grow and flourish. It will always be aroused, therefore, when we perceive that unjust structures are depriving the poor of the political, social, economic, or personal freedom that their human dignity demands. Gentleness finds the ways of expressing anger in “action on behalf of justice and participation in the transformation of the world.”² For those involved in ministry, education for justice and peace will be among the primary means.³

¹Cf. Summa Theologica I-II. 46.2, 4, 6.
²Synod of Bishops, 1971, Justice in the World, in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 63 (1971) 924.
³Cf. John Paul II, “Women: Teachers of Peace,” Origins 24 (# 28; December 22, 1994) 465-69; Jorge Mejia, “Dimensions of the Bishop’s Essential. Ministry of Peace,” Origins 24 (# 39; March 16, 1995) 641-648; Dolores Leckey, “Peacemaking and Creativity: Three Dynamics,” Origins 24 (# 45; April 27, 1995) 777-780. Leckey focuses on three dynamics that make for peace: listening, beauty, and laughter.

Source: Fr. Robert P. Maloney, C.M. A Further Look at “Gentleness”

Let us pray

Lord, grant us the graces we need as Vincentians, to creatively bring forth new projects that will educate for justice and peace in our local realities.

Scripture

Again [Jesus] entered the synagogue, and a man was there who had a withered hand. They watched him to see whether he would cure him on the sabbath, so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man who had the withered hand, “Come forward.” Then he said to them, “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. He looked around at them with anger; he was grieved at their hardness of heart and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored.

Mark 3:1-5