Sister Clare Crockett and the Good Zeal
Zeal after the Flood
Today is the tenth anniversary of the earthquake that ended the mortal life of the Servant of God Sister Clare Crockett. We wrote last Saturday to mark the tenth anniversary of the flood in Playa Prieta that God providentially made use of to prepare the way for the Servant of God’s entrance into heaven that we are now commemorating.
The five days between the flood and the earthquake were a time of intense zeal. According to Alone with Christ Alone:
The entire community took part in the cleaning operation with supernatural joy and generosity. From the moment the Virgin Mary had triumphed in their hearts, no task was too difficult for them; no challenge could overcome them. Sr. Clare joyfully lifted their hearts to God in song as they worked. She made everyone laugh with her jokes and comments and reminded them to offer their fatigue for the salvation of souls. And she was not the only one. Each generously gave her “yes” to the Lord during these days. Not a complaint was to be heard. If there was a difficulty or if they were at the end of a long morning of work, someone would exclaim, “Let’s offer this up for the souls in purgatory!” or “Let’s offer this up for so-and-so.” The rest would respond, “Yes! Let’s go for it!” and continue working even harder than before.
Clare Crockett and Encountering Zeal
What words would we most associate with Sister Claire? For most of those who have encountered her, it is probably joy. But another possible word is zeal. Consider how the joy and generosity with which Sister Clare and the others responded to an objectively devastating flood was directed towards supernatural goods, and especially towards the salvation of souls. 2 Corinthians 9:7 says that “God loveth a cheerful giver,” and Sister Clare’s joy and generosity were part of her gift, a gift that was for the salvation of souls and the pleasure of her Divine Lover, Jesus Christ.
This impression of Sister Clare’s zeal can be very strong. One of the monks states that when he read the life of the Sister Clare Crockett back in 2021, he experienced a significant — he says “life-changing” — encounter with the attractiveness of zeal. Seeing her life, he discovered how deeply she burned with a love for souls and their salvation, and, he says, comparing himself with her, he discovered that he was tepid within himself. But far from being discouraged, he was attracted.
If the story of her life brought him back in memory to his own life, not without regret, it very quickly changed from looking back to looking forward. He writes:
I experienced a conversion of sorts when I was 13. It was at the beginning of the second year of my Junior Cycle. I became inflamed with a desire to save souls. By the end of sixth year, when I was 18, this zeal was waning because I felt burnt out and had had a number of difficult experiences. In college, the way I had formerly expressed zeal began to seem both excessive and foolish. My faith didn’t lessen, but I was no longer primarily motivated by the salvation of souls. Reading Clare Crockett’s life showed me an example of true zeal for the salvation of souls that helped me recover the good sense of zeal while seeking to purify it. I reviewed my years of secondary school and college.
Things started to seem different because, while it’s true that I had a fervour for the salvation of souls and for the worship of Jesus immediately after my experience of conversion in secondary school, and while it’s true that I experienced a sort of cooling-off after graduation, especially in my fervour for the salvation of souls, I realised in reading about Sister Clare that it was more complicated than I had thought. I saw that my zeal in secondary school was good (even if there were some excesses) but immature, and that I had needed maturation and purification from the selfishness and coldness in me. The years that followed were a sort of “cooling off” from this zeal, though they still had fervour in them. I was now in a position to experience a restored and purified zeal.
When I read how intense Sister Clare’s desire to love and to put Jesus’ pleasure before all things was, and how this desire brought forth works of zeal for the salvation of souls in deep self-forgetfulness, and how this zeal manifested itself in humble and patient service — bearing the burdens of those around her, overcoming her natural repugnances — I experienced something like an awakening of that teenage zeal, with a new desire for it to be increased, purified, and emptied of self.
About Zeal
In chapter 72 of the Holy Rule, our holy Father, Benedict, tells us about two types of zeal.
The first type of zeal is an evil zeal of bitterness, bitter like the bitter waters of Mara in Exodus 15 or the bitter sea of Ezekiel 47. In Exodus 15, Moses threw a tree into the bitter waters and they became sweet; in Ezekiel 47, a double stream poured forth from the right side of the Temple into the bitter sea making the water sweet. Both of these are images of the passion of Jesus, which we have just celebrated. Moses can be seen as a type of Jesus, healing the bitterness within through His Holy Cross; the Temple can be seen as a type of His Sacred Body, for out of the right side of It a double-stream of Blood and water poured to heal the bitter waters of our souls until the sweet springs of the Living Waters of the Holy Spirit spring up unto everlasting life.
Saint Benedict knows that there are “bitter waters” within. He knows that there is an evil zeal of bitterness. He also knows that Christ can heal it. This is why He writes this chapter. He does not want us to be discouraged by the bitterness within, but He wants us to strive towards the other type of zeal, the sweet zeal of love, that can only come through the Cross.
Saint Benedict writes:
As there is an evil zeal of bitterness that separateth from God and leadeth to hell, so there is a good zeal that separateth from vices and leadeth to God and to life eternal. Thus the monks should exercise this zeal with most fervent love, that is, that they outdo each other in showing each other honour; bear most patiently with their infirmities (whether of body or of behaviour); compete with each other in obedience; no one pursue what he judgeth profitable for himself but rather what is for another, devote themselves chastely to the charity of the brethren, fear God with love, love their Abbot with sincere and humble charity, prefer nothing at all to Christ. May He lead us all alike to life everlasting.
-The Holy Rule, Chapter 72
The Good Zeal and Bitter Zeal
Saint Benedict speaks of two sorts of zeal, a good zeal and a bitter zeal. Both seem to be something more than ordinary Christian living. They both add to it a special fervor, a fervor that spurs to deed. Yet one he calls good, and the other evil! Saint Benedict distinguishes between the two through bitterness. One can say that bitterness is the fruit and the distinguishing character of the evil zeal. Its root is pride; the good zeal’s root is humility.
Bitterness shows that it is not the Good Spirit that is at work in the soul. The Greek word zēlos, like the Latin fervor, first of all means heat. Zeal implies a hot, fervent love that spurs to deed. Zeal has as its fountain and spring the very love that it manifests by its deeds. The spirit that inspired this love becomes manifest in the fruits of the zeal. Zeal can be likened to a channel of water (or a wind tunnel). Experience seems to show that something — some “water,” or some “wind” (or spirit) — flows through us. There is some source of it that we know not, but love blows where it will, almost as if something were blowing — or flowing — through us.
The Complicated Relationship to Zeal
Because zeal can easily become a bitter and hurtful expression of pride, we can have a complicated relationship to zeal. Moreover, zeal, because it moves to acts, can do a lot of harm if it is bitter. The zeal itself can be evil (or the acts can be foolish), and the result can be that one hurts himself or others, sometimes very gravely.
Yet, despite all its complications, true zeal is one of those truly essential things for a Christian life.
Zeal in Its Essence, Works, Effect, and Manifestations
Perhaps all of us — and not just the monk quoted above — need to grow in true and joyous zeal. Perhaps Sister Clare’s example can lead us to embrace a more fervent and holy zeal. In the next few weeks, Vultus Christi hopes to examine zeal from five angles.
The five are:
- Zeal’s Essence (and primary motivation): Jesus, love of Him and the delight in working for His good pleasure.
- A Work of Zeal: Salvation of Souls (also a secondary motivation).
- An Effect of Zeal: Self-forgetfulness.
- Two Manifestations of Zeal: In:
- Service with humble affection and patience,
- Bearing one another’s burdens.
- The Power of Zeal: Zeal overcomes self and one’s own natural repugnances or loves,
The Complimentary Examples of the Saints
Sister Clare’s example is the primary inspiration for this examination of zeal, so of course her example will come up again and again, but we will not limit ourselves to only looking at her life. We will especially look at Chapter 72 of the Holy Rule of Saint Benedict that we quoted above. And we will also look at other holy examples, and especially the example of Saint Thérèse.
Saint Thérèse is truly kindred and complimentary to Sister Clare. Saint Thérèse had a boldness in love, and she admired boldness in love. She said she wanted to love Jesus like He’d never been loved before. Then she did. But it’s remarkable how she did so. It was by responding to graces that most of us simply let slip by. One can sense sympathy in all of this between the “greatest Saint of modern times” (according to Saint Pius X’s apt phrase) and the relatively hidden and unknown Sister who had once wanted to be a “famous actress” and then a “famous nun”.
For both of them, their moment of total transformation began with a grace associated with a moment similar to those most of us simply let slip by unnoticed…again and again. For Saint Thérèse it was the “Christmas Miracle” of 1886, a grace so modest in its appearance that its significance can be easily missed at first glance. For Sister Clare, it was just kissing the Cross. As Sister Clare herself said:
When it was my turn, I got on my knees and kissed Jesus’ feet. That simple gesture lasted no more than ten seconds. Kissing the Cross, something that apparently seemed so trivial, had a very strong impact on me. Tertullian wrote [in his pre-Montanist period] that ‘there is absolutely nothing which makes men’s minds more perplexed about the divine works than the disproportion between the simplicity of the means employed and the grandeur of the effect obtained.’ I’m not sure how to explain exactly what happened. I didn’t see a choir of angels or a white dove flying down toward me, but I experienced the certainty that the Lord was on the Cross for me, and along with that certainty, I felt a burning pain, similar to what I had experienced when I was little during the Way of the Cross. Going back to the pew, I had a deep impression in me that I hadn’t felt before. I had to do something for Him who had given His life for me.
