It would be a grave mistake to judge Mother Franziska’s spirit and actions solely by contemporary insights, especially into current events or social justice issues. Each day the news brings stories of struggles for freedom and of serious violations of human rights in many places of the world. We read of real heroes putting their fortunes and very lives on the line for peace and justice. Is there any thing we can learn from a woman who lived over one hundred years ago? We know that her heart went out to poor servant girls, to retired and unemployed, sick servants, to orphans and to children of all levels of society who needed a Christian education. Her concern was always with the spiritual and moral good of those her sisters were serving. She did not have access to the varied opinions and different types of struggles that we know of today. She also was not exposed to the genocides of our own century. Can she teach us anything? Where does true justice come from? The teaching of recent popes tells us that there can be no justice without peace. True peace is a gift of God. It can be gained only by prayer. Intimacy with God in prayer was the source of Mother Franziska’s untireing good work for the poor, It was in communication with the heart of Jesus that she learned how to respond to the social needs that presented themselves to her one needy person at a time. It is in this same communion with God, much time spent with Sacred Scripture and meditation on the teachings of Jesus that we develop the compassionate heart that is like our Heavenly Father’s. It is here that we learn the right way, the way of peace to face the social issues of our time. This peace begins very near, at home, and only then can we with a right heart confront the larger issues of our world. Mother Franziska would have known what to do today as she did in her own time.
